Dark and Dusty
by Bekassin
Summary: What have a piece of cactus, a heavy storm and new business associates in common? - They mean trouble for Griff King.
1. Chapter 1

There are some days when you open your eyes, and you know you probably shouldn´t have. Griff felt one of these days coming. Big black clouds build up against the mountains of the high plateau and the air crackled with electricity. It would rain sometime soon. There was a storm coming. Perhaps that was the reason for Griff´s dark mood.

Well it could also have something to do with the rope that was strained between the two bedposts. He didn´t see it at all in the twilight of the early morning bunkhouse and made a big nosedive.

Or perhaps it was the piece of cactus in his boot. As he was limping to the barn he wondered to himself if some of the spikes found a new and comfortable home in his foot sole.

But all these shenanigans at least showed him that he was getting nearer to being accepted on the Ponderosa. Being a convict on parole and a new hand at the same time he had to expect some reaction from the other workmen. He wouldn't lose any sleep over some pranks.

He just wished they would wait until he finished breaking the new stock of horses Mr. Cartwright bought recently. They were part of a big army contract and had to be saddle broke by the end of the week. Something that would presumably break his neck.

Most evenings he would be sore and would wake up several times during the night because he made a wrong movement. As he landed on his nose this morning he could have sworn he heard his ribs crunch. But he wouldn't complain. He actually liked the work. It was a lot better than lugging sacks or feeding chickens.

"Morning," he nearly jumped at the greeting, but turned around to the bodacious form of Hoss, the middle of the three Cartwright sons. Apart from his appearance he was one of the gentlest and most caring persons Griff had ever met. And as if he wanted proof of this very point he stuffed some buttered buns in Griff's hand.

"You missed breakfast, and I figured it would be more fun watching you break these horses with you on top of them." he smirked:"Joe is waiting for you at the corral, hurry up."

~0~

He hit the ground a lot harder this time. He rolled aside, just a split-second before a black hoof came down directly beside his face. He surely wouldn´t break this horse, not before he exorcised it. Crawling backwards without letting the mare out of sight he reached the fence. He watched as three of the men tried to catch this spawn of hell.

"Is she giving you trouble?" the man leaned on the fence. Dressed neatly in black without the slightest bit of dust on him.

Griff's face broke into a grin, as he hoisted himself up.

"Not at all."

"If you say so." replied Adam.

He was the oldest. He didn´t have Hoss good-natured personality, but a tendency to indoctrinate everyone and everything. He was mostly right with what he was talking about. And that made it just more difficult for Griff to stay polite. He knew he fell on his a**. He didn´t need anybody telling him this fact.

"Don´t you want to take a break? This was your fifth fall in an hour." Joe pushed back his hat and looked at Griff speculatively.

"And a hard one too."

He was the youngest son, a charming good-looking guy with a knack for getting in trouble and a gift for getting out of it again.

"One more try." Griff didn´t wait for an answer.

"You know, sometimes I don´t know who is breaking whom." Adam wondered, while he watched Griff climbing back on the saddle.

"What do you mean?" Joe asked.

"Look at him. Every fight is something personal. Even with a horse."

"Mhm." Joe agreed.

He knew why.

Adam arrived back at the ranch just weeks ago after a long absence. He hadn´t heard Griff´s life story and Joe had a feeling, that it wasn´t his place to tell him. Griff would tell him eventually. And if not, so be it. Joe had been shocked about the fact that Griff had spent most of his youth in a prison. Surviving in prison as a boy was something you only accomplish by winning every single fight. Joe pondered on this thought for a while. Imagining being alone in a cage with murderers and crooks, Joe shivered involuntarily. He was happy Griff saved his father during a riot in the Nevada state prison, where the Cartwright patriarch was working as an inspector. Being the man he was, Ben took Griff with him to spend the time he still had under parole on the Ponderosa.

"LOOK OUT!"

The scream lashed over the paddock and made Joes head leap up. He had to look twice. A cougar, a damn real live cougar trotted through the fenced compound. Foam was covering his mouth and he eyed the spectacle next to him with an interested look. Rabies. Had to be.

At the same time Griff was in real trouble keeping the mare at the opposite side of the fold. While preventing the horse from getting near the cat he came dangerously close to the fence. The mare must have thought the same, because she started bashing him against the bare beams the second she could reach them. This time is was Griff who yelled but kept sticking stubbornly on the back of the brute.

Joe reacted purely on instinct. Pull the gun, aim, fire, everything happened in one fluent motion. He watched the cougar fall and heard Adams yell, it sounded angry.

After that he saw Griff. Startled by the shot the horse had made some sudden jumps backwards, catching Griff by surprise. He had been simply torn out of the saddle but with one of his boots still firmly attached to the stirrup. His head and shoulders scraped over the ground, as the mare tried, blinded by panic, to break through the fence.

Griff could feel his arm being tossed into one of the poles and he sensed something hit his back with force. Around him voices grew louder. He could hear screams, but he couldn´t make out the words.

Desperate he ripped at his boots and finally his foot came loose of the trapped boot.

His seventh collision with the ground knocked the wind right out of him, but he immediately started crawling, before this devils descendant was able to trample him for good.

Frantically he dragged himself through the dust, until something suddenly griped him under his armpits. He gave a surprised yell and heard a murmured: "I know, but we have to get you out of here."

He turned his head and saw the concentration in Joes face as he dragged Griff out of the paddock. He must have lost some seconds there, because the next thing he could remember was the wood of the fence at his back as he sat slumped against it and Joes hands tapping his legs carefully, Griff suppressed a groan as Joe pressed on his right thigh.

"Where did it get you?" asked Joe immediately.

"I'm OK, oh crap" said Griff, just because he felt good saying it. He lifted himself in a more upright position. He could see Adam, bowing over the dead cat's body, making sure not to touch it. Black spots started dancing in his field of vision, but with all the blows he took today he shouldn´t be surprised by that.

"Where is the beast?" He asked.

"I shot it." Joe was still crouching in front of him and observed him carefully.

"You shot the horse?"

"I shot the cat."

"Right, where is the horse? I could tell I was getting somewhere with it." Griff squinted a couple of times to get rid of the black dots and searched for support on the fence.

"Hey." Joe held him in place as he tried to get up.

"You're not going anywhere."

Griff looked up at Joe then noticing he looked quite pale.

"You all right?"

"Me?" Joe snorted:" I weren´t dragged through a paddock." He tried to make it sound light, but the hands that held Griff in place were still trembling.

Griff screwed his eyes up.

"I´m sorry." it suddenly broke out of Joe.

"You dragged me through that paddock?" Griff asked.

"I just shot. I didn´t think about the horse,"

Griff interrupted him before he had to listen to more of this nonsense.

"And how the hell did you plan to slay the cougar without a gun? Were you going to ask him politely to drop down dead? He could have bitten someone!" Griff let himself rest against the pole.

"And rabies is a pretty shitty death."

Joe nodded absent-mindedly, his face still plastered with guilt. So Griff made him fall with a good poke against his knee.

"What was that for?"

"It was not your fault! Got that?"

Griff's side and his lower back started pounding in a rhythm and now he was able to feel the splinters in his leg. This beast had tried to peel him alive.

"It´s dead" Adam said, as he got to his feet, wiping grit from his face.

"At last." growled Griff.

"Can we now get on?"

"You're kidding." Joe grimaced. He was still sitting in the dirt.

Griff reached out to Adam and let himself be helped to his feet.

"Not at all. Let´s get on. There are horses waiting." Griff's right leg simply went from under him and only Adams spirited grip saved him from his eights encounter with Mother Earth.

"All right, perhaps they will wait five minutes longer." He admitted while he was eased down again by Adam and Joe.

"Perhaps." Adam answered, his point accentuated by the onset of rolling thunder.

~0~

There had been much agitation and even more ado. Griff had reassured them over and over again that he was alright. Well, his head hurt and his shoulders and back would become very colourful, but next to that, he was fine. Except for the leg. The leg was bruised. That's it. Nothing some gentle rounds on the coral wouldn´t help.

"Look we have a contract to fill, let's get moving," Griff said, ignoring the looks of concern he was getting. Joe made a face to say he was able to spot a red herring when he saw one. After all, they had work to do. But let the matter drop. He knew Griff would just close up completely if he tried to push him. He regretted not having Candy with them who had known Griff before his incarceration and had a wire to the youth a lot more than anybody else. But he had gone off to Carson City with their father to take care of some errands and bring a new business partner with them on his way back. So Joe had to hope Griff would trust them enough to tell him if something really was wrong.

"At least take a bath." Adam told him, as they dismounted in front of the main house. Griff seemed to have trouble getting down from his horse, but shooed all well-meaning hands aside.

"You don´t smell like roses yourself." He murmured, gripping Thunders saddle horn for dear life as he tried to lock his knees in place.

To his surprise Adam laughed.

"You have to have your legs full of splinters with all your crashing into fences today. Having a soak will help with the soreness and the splinters will come out a lot easier."

He was right. Griff knew that much. Damn.

"I´ll take care of the horses." Joe took the bridles with a speed that left Griff swaying. Finally finding his balance he mumbled something as he made his way to the bunk house.

~0~

Adam watched the stiff movements of the youth and felt worry bubble up within him. He had seen how Griff was dragged by that animal. Several times the mare had tried to break through the fence and the sounds Griff had made as he was tossed against the fence had made Adam feel a little sick.

Still this boy had to be stubborn. What did he get out of it? Only pain. And Joe. Oh Joe. Adam had seen the guilt in his eyes. Yes it had been stupid. But Adam had to admit, he hadn´t come up with another solution. It was one of those occasions you had to choose between pest and cholera. Nobody died, so the solution had to be the right one.

Griff had simply stated that he was ok and had climbed on his horse. Just like that.

Adam sighed and made his way over to the kitchen and Hop Sing, their cook, to ask him to prepare a bath. In one of Hop Sings many chests there might be a little something that would be very valuable in Griff's bathwater. And after that he could look forward to an afternoon with all the joy and excitement one spontaneously connected with the term "paperwork".

~0~

Griff waited until the door had closed behind him, before he let himself grip the upper bunkbed. The world around him whirled and occasionally changed direction which made him come very near to losing his breakfast.

He growled as he levered himself into the lower bed and gingerly stretched his right leg. Oh crap!

Cautious, he laid his head in his hands and waited for the pounding behind his temples to decrease.

Back at the paddock he believed all of his bones had remained intact. He wasn´t so sure anymore. Carefully he slipped his hand beneath his jacket and touched the point where the horse had smashed him into the fence. It hurt. It hurt like hell. And as he looked at his hand he could see clotted blood sticking to it.

"Marvelous," He moaned.

"Griff, is that you?" the sudden voice made him jump, and his ribs really didn´t like the idea of jumping. Hunched over he saw two boots quickly come closer and Lucas concerned face appeared.

"Jesus! Griff, what happened?"

Griff snorted at the recollection of all that happened that morning. Lucas who had grabbed him by the shoulders misread his reaction and immediately let go again.

"I fell off a horse." Griff managed to get out and couldn't withhold a laugh. It hurt nearly as much as the fence.

Lucas stared at him with a crackerjacking lack of understanding. It was worth it for this face only.

Griff's beginnings with Lucas had been humble, but since then he had come to like Lucas. He was a kind heart and for some mysterious reason he was really considerate when it came to Griff.

Presumably Candy had a finger in the pie there, estimated Griff.

"You can´t go to bed like that. Is that blood?" Lucas had caught a glimpse of Griff's fingers.

"I'm just here to grab some new clothes. Damn brute slammed me into the fence. Adam thought a soak would help with the..." he interrupted himself,

"You know, splinters."

"Wait a second." Lucas face disappeared and Griff could hear him rummaging through something, he emerged seconds later, his right arm laid heavy with fresh clothes.

"You´re able to get up?" He asked.

"For Pete's sake!" Griff shooed the next volley of helping hands aside and hitched himself up at the frame of the upper bunk bed.

"I´ll manage."

Lukas watched the youth stumbling out of the bunk house and caught up with him.

"Wanted a wash myself. Mind if I come along?"

Griff shrugged his shoulders and regretted it immediately.

The bath was already set and concluding from the odors of the steam clouds contained a lot more than just soap. Lucas smiled and planned to thank Hop Sing sometime soon.

Candy had asked him to keep an eye on Griff. Lucas would have done it anyway. There was something about this youth that made him want to protect him. He heard what Griff had gone through and somewhere in Lucas mind the thought was well set that he would try to make up for the blows.

Griff had settled in pretty neatly by now, but Lucas couldn´t fail to notice that he more often than not would leave the bunk house to sleep beneath one of the old trees near the stable.

It was pure coincidence that Lucas found out what this was about. He came back late from an outpost and was surprised to hear a voice just outside the stable. It had been Griff and he had explained himself over and over again that nobody was going to lock him up here. As Lucas entered the cramped and stuffy bunk house he suddenly had known, which nightmare had driven Griff outside.

Lucas washed his face and left his towel near the washing bowl, so he could pick it up in about ten minutes, and look after Griff without admitting he looked after Griff. He asked the youth if he should help him, as he had seen him stand, still fully dressed next to the bath. As expected he was met with a rebuff.

Lucas stepped out on the court and saw Joe closing the barn door. He looked exhausted although it was only noon. Something was not quite right – stretching his back he started walking towards Joe – and whatever it was, he would get to the bottom of it.


	2. Chapter 2

As Lucas strolled over the yard the first drips began to fall. Within moments heavy drops slapped on the ground, purifying the dusty air and transforming the dried soil into sludge.

Joe remained under the canopy of the barn and watched the haze disappearing. Lukas managed to join him without getting completely drenched.

"Was about time," he grumbled with a glance up at the clouds. For days they had hung above them, imminent and menacing.

Joe nodded.

Lukas decided not to beat about the withered bush.

"I just ran into Griff."

Joes normally open and friendly face darkened.

"He didn´t want to tell me what happened. Just kept mumbling about falling off a horse."

With his last words Joe gave a cheerless snort.

"That was my fault." he glanced over at Lukas, than he suddenly blurred out.

"A Cougar. Can you imagine? Smack in the corral. I shot it and spooked Griff's horse. He got caught up in the stirrups." Joe interrupted himself and for a couple of seconds stared out at the rain.

"I really thought… "Joe shook his head at the memory.

"He just got up and tried to climb on this damn horse again. We practically had to beat him back here." He breathed deeply and continued.

"With this rain, I hope the matter has resolved itself."

Lukas stifled the urge to rest a hand on Joes shoulder. He could imagine what happened this morning, and understood why it shook Joe to the core.

"He seems to be fine." Lucas said instead. "Oh Crud!"

"What?"

Lucas grinned,

"I seem to have forgotten my towel in the washhouse."

He pulled his leather vest over his head.

"I should go´n get it." He held for a moment and added:" It´ll come out alright."

Joe watched the man running through the rain to the washhouse, and somehow got the feeling that he might even be right

~0~

"Joe, have you given anybody an advance?" Adams voice cut through the spacious living area.

Joe, who let the rain run from his hat shrugged his shoulders.

"Not as far as I recall."

He heard Adam rustling through some papers, a look of frustration crossing his tanned features.

Joe went round the old grandfather clock and came to a stop in front of the great writing desk. His brother was totally swamped in account books, purchase receipts and all kinds of other documents, which stacked around him. Adam had opened the safe and was frowning at a transaction.

"What´s the matter?" asked Joe and pushed some veterinarian reports further into the table, before they could fall down.

"Twenty dollars are missing, unless I miscalculate." Adams voice didn´t leave the slightest hint, that there could be any mistake, not in this or in any other world. He put the transaction back on the table and looked at Joe through grave eyes.

"Who would nick something here?" asked Joe.

~0~

"Griff? I just forgot my towel and – Griff?"

Lucas slid through the door and looked around. Griff´s gear hung over one of the benches to the right, he had eased himself into one of the tubs. Just his knees and his head stuck up over the milky white water. His eyes were closed and his head leaned against the wall of the vat, his nose barely above the water surface.

"Just getting my stuff." Repeated Lucas and made his way over to the water bowl, but stopped, when he didn´t receive an answer

"Griff?"

Again nothing.

"Griff!" louder this time.

A splash and the sound of slopping water followed. Together with Griff´s hectic efforts to right himself, and confusion as to why he was drowning in his bed, and trying not to drown at the same time.

Three quick steps later Lucas gripped Griff´s upper arm. Griff stared somehow disoriented but quickly fixed on Lucas

"I..." he blew water from the tip of his nose.

"Must have dozed off."

"Nearly drowning, that's what you did." Lucas answered and let go of him.

"Rubbish." Griff snapped.

In the following silence the pattering of the rain seemed to grow louder.

"You hear that too?" asked Griff and tried patiently to get some water out of his ear.

"It´s pouring." Lucas answered.

"Aw crap." Again Griff had submerged up to his chin.

"It´s needed."

"Sure, but we won´t get the horses ready in time."

Lucas gave him a severe look

"Enjoy the break."

Griff mumbled something sliding deeper into the water.

"Shall I lend you a hand with those splinters later?" Lucas offered, he had already put up with the inevitable rebuff as Griff very quietly said.

"Thanks."

There was a short break, than Griff asked

"There is one other thing though…"

"Shoot."

"Could you help me up? I don´t know what is in this water, but it's squidgy as hell."

~0~

The train compartment rocked slightly with the rattling rhythm of the rails below it. Two slightly stiff looking gentlemen Ben and Candy sat in the back part of the dining car.

The tables were set up nicely with white linen and silverware, but the food hadn´t arrived yet.

The journey so far had been a pleasant one, the company was informal, even if you could tell that the two gentlemen were used to immobile tables and lengthy after-dinner speeches.

"Mr. Strack, is it true, that this is your very first journey to the west?" Ben asked. He had bought a round of a splendid brand of sherry.

Mr. Strack took a sip from the little bulbous glass and shook his head.

" I have been out here once or twice. Even though I´m in the privileged position of having an excellent overseer occasional inspections are imperative."

Mr. Strack was a middle sized man, with a tidily curled moustache and intelligent eyes. He had already started to go bald, but he took his fate on the chin. He was one of those men who would remind you of neat stacks of goods, a firm handshake and family-run companies in the third generation. This impression was underlined by the matching three-piece suite. Meeting Mr. Strack in a mine was as unlikely, as sighting the loch ness monster in one's morning coffee.

"I see." said Ben.

Candy also took a swing of the sherry. It took all his self-control not to pull a wry face. The taste reminded him of the winter Hop Sing got bored and had a try at his "Bonanza bourbon". Its drinkability was suitable to only a limited extent, but you could start a fire with it anywhere and everywhere, and he had managed to get all the rust of the snaffles. Unfortunately he hadn´t wiped them good enough. The carriage horses had been drunk for days.

Strack´s companion, a tall man named Schmied raised his glass to Candy and self-indulgently closed his eyes while he drank. Candy unobtrusively pushed his glass behind the salt shaker, someone who drank something like that would also likely gorge small children.

Ben emptied his glass and Candy reconsidered his opinion. But he still had to get rid of this stuff somehow. He started to push glass and saltshaker to the table centre.

"How long do we have to travel until we reach your ranch?" Mr. Schmied asked.

"Oh, about two hours with the train, and the same time with the stage coach, towards evening we will arrive in Virginia City. To be honest, I hadn´t counted on proceeding so quickly. My son´s won´t expect us within the next two days. We will have to rent a buggy in the city." He smiled somehow nervous and Candy knew exactly why.

Returning without warning was risky. Returning without warning and bringing guests with them was plain reckless.

The last time Ben came home unexpected a burning carriage had stood in the yard and thirty-two rabbits were on the loose. Thirty-three if you count the one for dinner.

"I must say I´m very much looking forward to getting to know your sons and your ranch. After everything you told us it sounds like a small paradise." mused Mr. Strack and smiled encouragingly at Ben, who had spied Candy´s sherry behind the salt shaker

"Sure, sure, paradisiac." He agreed and emptied the glass at once.

~0~

"Last one." Lucas laid the tweezers aside in triumph.

"You look like you had a fight with a porcupine."

Griff´s laugh was somehow compelled. He had spent the last two hours getting little pieces of fence pulled out of body parts, he would prefer to leave unnamed. They should at least save up the bad jokes.

"Wait, Hops Sing gave me a little...here we are" Lukas got out a can, opened it and held it under Griff´s nose. Aloe, vanilla and chamomile: Griff was able to identify. Into the bargain came around a dozen other scents Griff didn´t know, but would like to keep smelling for a while.

Lucas applied the mixture extensively, not only over the perforated part of Griff´s body, but also very cautiously on the already darkening patches on his back.

Griff flinched involuntarily as Lucas started to gently massage his affected shoulders.

"Sorry." Lucas stopped to view his work," That'll tide you over."

Griff heard him closing the can, he left his eyes closed while Lucas bandaged his thigh.

" I would prefer it if you would see a doctor about this. Especially your neck. I swear I have never seen such colours, and I´m quite sure they should never be seen on a human body."

Griff smirked and carefully turned himself until he laid flat on his stomach.

Although it was only just past two o clock in the afternoon the storm had rendered the sky as dark as night and Griff was feeling dead tired.

The sheets rustled as Lucas pulled them up to his ears.

"Sleep a little. The way I see it, the boys will be back in no time, and after that it will be way too loud in here."

Griff mumbled something, half sunken in his pillow.

"What was that?" Lucas moved closer to the bunk, so he was able to see Griff´s face without having his neck strained.

"I…" Griff seemed to struggle with himself and finally let his head roll back in the pillow.

"Not that important."

"Come on, out with it?"

Griff face became visible once more.

"I just wanted to ask, if you – ah, no it´s dumb."

Lucas remained waiting.

"Would you lend me money?" Griff asked quickly.

"Sure, how much do you need?" Lucas answered without a second thought.

Griff blinked confused by the quick reply.

"Whatever you can spare. Five dollars?"

Lucas chuckled.

"I´ll see what I have lying around."

Griff let his head sink back in the pillow. If he could lay exactly like this for long enough, perhaps his shoulders would forget they were supposed to hurt.

"Dream well." He heard the muffled sound through the blankets.

He answered somehow unclear and the last thing he was aware about was Lucas hand, stroking calmingly over the back of his head.

~0~

As Lucas had foreseen: It took less than two hours till the hands had been driven back by the thunderstorm and it got loud and cramped in the bunkhouse.

"Wait and see." Dusty said, while he shook his coat and immediately got trouble from everyone who had been hit by the drops. He ignored the indignant interjections and calmly proceeded.

" There will be more. I can smell it. This is just a little foretaste. Next week we will be running for our hats, and our horses!" he grinned widely.

Dusty was one of those man, who would like nothing more than to stand in the storm and the rain only to see the lightings dance. With this taste he was pretty lonesome at the moment.

Goliath, the oldest hand and nearly toothless, no not really toothless, he always had them with him, in a sack around his neck. He pushed some more wood in the oven and eyed the thrashing rain through the small window with suspicious looks.

"I like my hat where it is thank you very much."

"That's easy to set up." Dusty answered.

"Somewhere here I have some excellent fishhooks. We attach the rim to your ears and twist everything together neatly."

"I gonna twist you." Goliath growled but joined in on the laughter.

"My old man always said." Jones interrupted. Jones was a huge guy from Texas, who originally was just passing through, meanwhile he passed through for about two years.

"If it´s raining cats and dogs, and won´t stop, you have to hang out something red. At the highest place you can find."

"Something red?" Goliath asked curious.

"A shirt or something. But it has to be red." Jones insisted.

"And that's gonna help?" Dusty asked distrustful.

"Well, it never made it worse." Countered Jones. The discussion continued and got livelier after Jones offered Dusty to pin him on top of the barn so he would be the very first to see the weather swing.

Nobody except Lucas noticed Griff sneaking out of the bunkhouse with not much more than a murmured excuse about looking after Thunder.

Thunder was a Saddlebred, but with his 5´6 foot stick measure and his grey-white marbled fur he was strangely atypical of his breed. Next to this he was an unbelievably devious, shifty beast. Griff had gotten him from the other hands as some joke. They had expected anything but Thunder seeing Griff as the only lovable human on this side of the Rocky Mountains.

Down to the present day he would throw everybody, apart from Griff, within twenty minutes. He already made Goliath climb a tree, after he threw him of course. Goliath had tried to frighten him away by throwing stuff at him. He understood too late that Thunder had chased him up an apple tree for a reason.

In the end Goliath was angry, Thunder ate his own weight in apples and the hands learnt something very important: This carrion of a horse wasn´t only reckless, he was also clever.

In this weather for anybody else to visit Thunders stall would have been suicide. But Griff would have been able to have breakfast on Thunders oats, and get away with it.

~0~

In the interim, Hoss had his own problems. He'd had a funny feeling about the north pasture, and once he and his crew had headed that way, the field was under water up to their knees. The cattle on the meadow were stuck in the sloppy mess and it took them to the early afternoon to free them. On their way to a higher pasture they had been surprised by the storm. One of the horses shied and threw a cursing Jeffrey down a slope and into a huge bush of nettles.

To get him up again Hoss had made his way into the nettles himself.

His oilskin coat had shielded him off against the most, but Jeffrey looked utterly miserable and the rest of the crew were soaked through so Hoss had given up on any thoughts of bringing the cattle to the high plateau. Instead they let them search shelter in the forest.

The fences on the plateau had needed mending all along, and this way no cow would be able to hurt itself on a rusty railing.

Hop Sing had caught them riding in and shooed Jeffrey into his kitchen immediately. As they peeled Jack out of his clothes the real damage showed for the first time. His arms, neck and some spots on his chest where the nettles got into his collar were severely reddened and blistered.

"No Ploblem." Hop Sing had said and started to rub a big lump of curd soaps in his hands.

"What is he up to?" Jeffrey had said beseechingly to Hoss.

"One second!" the cook had smirked and smeared the soap foam on Jeffreys arms.

"Hey, what the ...oh" Jeffrey´s resistant's broke in the instant he felt the burning subside under the cooling foam.

After Jeffrey looked like he robbed the local barbershop Hob Sing had made a fresh pot of coffee, gave both of them a steaming hot cup and made his way to the bunkhouse to: "Stop the pool lads flom fleezing to death."

Jeffrey had sat himself down on the roofed terrace and Hoss had wandered over to the living room where he could hear his brothers discussing

~0~

Thunder was nervous, but who could blame him?

He quieted the moment Griff started stroking his muscular neck. The stallion neighed softly and nibbled at Griff´s shirt.

Griff savored the peace until a sudden sound outside had him on the alert. Straightening himself he said.

"You may come in. I´m alone."

A lean figure slid through the barn window and effortlessly jumped down without causing the slightest noise. The silhouette crossed the barn purposefully, but stopped before Thunders box, as the horse folded back his ears.

"You got it?" the intruder asked.

"Yeah." Griff bit out through clenched teeth.

"I got in real trouble for getting it though." He dipped into his pocket and extracted a bundle of banknotes.

The shadow greedily palmed it and hissed.

"It ain't enough."

"It´s everything I could get a hold of."

"You know what will happen if it´s not enough."

"I know." Griff got louder, but caught himself as Thunder started to scrape.

"I tried alright? With this damn rain we couldn´t finish the horses. We were promised a bonus for every head we make. I counted that in and now I can´t get it."

"There are other possibilities." The silhouette continued.

"I tried. I tried everything." Griff replied.

"Try harder." the figure hissed.

"I´ll come back!" with three fast steps the thug vanished again.

Griff let himself drop on to one of the barrels in Thunders stall. Where should he get this wicked money? Growling unwillingly he pressed the ball of his thumps on his eyes to jam something against that hammering headache. It didn´t really help.

Thunder rubbed his head against Griff´s shoulder and he automatically embraced the stallion´s head.

"You wouldn´t be as dumb as I am."

Thunder snorted.

"But you know, you can always trust them...to come back." Griff leaned his head against the soft fur above Thunder´s nose. The horse stood perfectly still and gently blew in the direction of his human, who seemed somehow dysfunctional today.


	3. Chapter 3

"What are you talking about?" Hoss asked, a steaming cup of coffee in his big hand as he eased himself down on the sofa.

Joe replied before Adam could open his mouth. "Twenty dollars are missing."

Hoss furrowed his brow and suddenly started laughing.

"Oh that...no, Griff had asked me for an advance. Figured he wouldn´t be able to bail out of here anytime soon, so I gave it to him."

"Did he tell you what he needs the money for?" Adam asked, an icy edge to his voice.

"Should I ask about that?" Hoss replied. "Would be the first time."

"No. No, you´re right. But it´s funny somehow."

"Lot of things are funny at the moment." Hoss agreed and his face lightened up as Hop Sing placed a plate with warm biscuits in front of him. "With all this flood water we'll be breeding sea cows before long. And then we will never know if we are fishers or farmers." He laughed heartily and dunked the biscuit in his coffee.

"Good thing you were so stubborn, when you got ´that funny feeling´. If you wouldn´t have felt funny all the cattle would have drowned." Adam got up. "I think I´ll go for a walk." He grabbed his oil cloth coat. On his way out he greeted Jeffrey, who was still covered in soap foam and made a memorial performance of a human cloud. But Adam just raised an eyebrow and disappeared into the rain.

"What bit him?" Hoss asked after his brother was gone.

"I fear he will bite someone, very soon." Joe answered, and stuffed his mouth with the remaining biscuits.

~0~

Of course the stagecoach got stuck. Several times. And of course it was Candys job to get out and shovel the wheels free. Now he was sitting, dripping wet and covered in mud, in the rented buggy and tried not to touch anything.

The two stiff gentleman seemed to be quite amazed at the lightning dancing in the night sky and Candy was glad about every clap of thunder, because as long as they looked at the sky they wouldn't notice that the bridge they were crossing, was already a hand-span underwater.

The dried out ground hadn´t been able to take up the mass of water, now it gushed through the river currents and burst the banks. Candy had experienced that before, in his first year on the ponderosa. They had been totally cut off for one week, while they waited for the floods to decline.

"Nature at work here is quite spectacular." Observed Mr. Strack as a wickerwork of lightings shot across the sky. The resounding clap of thunder had them all ducking their heads.

"We should have stayed in town." murmured Candy suppressed.

Ben´s eyes kept glued to the road, but answered.

"Then we would have been stuck for days."

"In contrast to drown on the way home in minutes?" Candy couldn´t withhold the sharp answer, but regretted it immediately. He could vividly imagine how Ben would have reacted to his boys being shut off without him. A shaved tiger would have been more sociable.

"We are nearly there." Ben announced finally, as the outlines of the barn manifested themselves through the heavy rain curtain.

"What the..." Candy leaned forward and peered to the building.

"Somebody is on the roof."

Bens head shot around and Candy was able to hear his sharp drawn breath. A Silhouette tumbled over the barn roof, frequently blown over by the storm he pulled himself stubbornly forward.

"What is he up to?" Ben was aghast.

The Silhouette reached the gable and started to fumble at the shingles.

"He is crazy." Candy stated.

Then it´s probably Joe, the ominous thought shot throught Bens mind.

The Silhouette seemed to stick something between the shingles.

Now they were near enough, so they could see that it… was a red flag?

"Oh my god." Let out Mr. Strack: "There is a man!" he pointed at the roof " And he..."

"What´s that?" asked Mr. Schmied, as the cloth swelled in the wind.

"A Long John." Candy answered stoical.

"Is this a custom around here?" Mr. Strack asked irritated.

"An old tradition." Ben heard himself say.

"What´s the use of it?" asked Mr. Schmied and immediately corrected himself. "I mean, what's the significance?"

"It shall… bring a fresh breeze." Candy said and caught a stinging glance from Ben.

"You´ll climb up this barn, bring down whoever you find there and inform that person to report to me." Ben hissed while the two stiff Gents were busy staring.

"With his underwear?" Candy asked with barely suppressed laughter.

"I don´t care what..."

They had reached the court and Ben stopped suddenly, as he saw the ghost, sitting casually on his veranda. He was bright white and his contours seemed strangely foggy.

Even Candy had stopped with his cackle.

The ghost waved at them and stood up to knock at the front door.

"I thought they can walk through doors." Candy observed.

The two stiff Gents sat even stiffer.

"What´s that?" asked Mr. Strack.

"Oh, that, that is…" Candy struggled for words, as a figure in a dark coat swept around the bend, with a drawn weapon in his hand. It determinedly approached the buggy and Candy involuntary reached for his gun.

"Did you see him?" the figure shouted.

"Adam? Is that you?" Ben called surprised.

"Who else should I be?" Adam still gathered speed.

"Have you seen him?"

"Seen who? Oh hell" Candy froze as the smell reached him.

Even in this rain the stench was unmistakable. Once Adam neared one could recognize the dung, which colored his coat dark and hang in lumps on his shoulders and arms.

"Adam." Ben´s voice could let iron corrode: "What are you doing here?"

"There was somebody on the barn. I nearly got him, but I slipped." He looked down on himself and was taken aback.

"Probably near the dung heap."

"Whoever it is, he isn´t here. So would you please search for him somewhere else?" Ben growled.

"Ah, so this is one of your sons?" Mr. Strack interjected. He had finally taken his attention from the white form on the terrace. He turned to have a good look at Adam.

"Yes, this is my… Son." Ben visibly tried to keep his composure:

"Normally he isn´t so ...Adam, would you go and search for this intruder? Please?" Adam turned in place.

Mr. Strack watched him leaving and carefully stated

"He is…. extraordinary isn't he?"

"Pa? You're back already?" Hoss, armed with an umbrella, hurried to the buggy his younger brother not far behind him.

"I – yes we are. This is..." the rest of that answer was drowned out by a roll of thunder.

Hoss shook hands with the guests and helped them from the carriage as the bunkhouse door was pulled open.

A giant of a man tossed a smaller one out into the rain and yelled,

"This should cool you down." He looked up, recognized his employer and his face got chalky.

"Evening Mr. Cartwright. You had a nice journey?"

Mr. Strack and Mr. Schmied were frozen to the spot and just gaped at him.

Their eyes darted to the white figure on the terrace, to Adams quickly disappearing back, to the two dumb founded guys in front of the bunkhouse, all was suddenly interrupted as a loud bang reverberated around the barn. As all heads turned it bolted again and a lightly deranged Goliath darted his upper body from the barn window and stated.

"Everything is peachy. But I could use some wood, it´s getting awful wet in here." Then he recognized the carriage and he quickly disappeared.

Joe´s riotous laughter stalled under the look he received from his father.

Mr. Strack was the first one to regain his composure and his voice. He righted his jacket and said

"A highly unusual paradise, Mr. Cartwright."

~0~

Candy closed the huge stable gates and locked them so the wind wouldn't rip them open again. He had brought the rented buggy and the horses in already and was more than happy to not have to be a guest at the Cartwright dinner table tonight.

Mr. Cartwrights look easily could have been used as mordant dye. Candy kept on chuckling while hanging the gear and providing the horses with water. If the animals had looked up on the way with their mouths open, they wouldn´t have needed water for about a week such was the torrential rain.

More out of a habit he checked the other boxes and was surprised to find Griff in Thunders stall. He sat in the corner on Thunders manger, his upper body leaning against the horses head and his eyes closed.

Candy sighed. This meant trouble. Griff came here if he got problems. Normally Candy would give him a couple of hours and then find something to do in the barn until Griff started talking. But this time Candy hadn't been there for the kid.

He felt a sting of guilt. It had been a tough piece of work to get Griff out of his shell. He didn´t trust easy. And even as he did, he stayed reluctant. After the years of abuse by his father who had finally send him to jail everything else would have been a miracle.

Candy opened the box door quietly. Thunder glanced in his direction but didn´t budge a single millimeter and stayed perfectly still.

"Griff?" Candy spoke gently but still startled the boy.

A moment later the youth looked around wildly then his face changed. A hand wrapped protectively around his ribs he curled up and let out an indefinable sound.

"Hey" Candy was surprised again at the half growling laugh Griff gave.

"Didn´t expect you." It took some time till Griff started to right himself and looked up into Candy´s concerned face

"You´re back."

"What was that?" Candy asked, ignoring Griff attempts at casual conversation.

Griff quickly thought about what he should tell. He didn´t want Candy going back into the mode where he wouldn´t let him out of his sight for weeks. But as he looked up into this worried face, he nearly laughed despite himself. This was Candy. Just Candy. The Candy who always took his side, no matter what. His stomach clenched painfully. The Candy who could never know about what he was doing. The Candy who would beat him to hell and back if he ever found out.

Perhaps it was the pain that made his shoulders tighten and constrict his breathing. Perhaps it was the stress of the last few weeks. But suddenly the walls began to close in. Candy´s hand, at first reassuring and calming grew heavier, nailed him to the barrel. Trapped him.

Nonsense, he scolded himself. But he couldn´t shake the sudden panic. Thunder started to prance and Candy shot him an estimating look but quickly returned his attention to Griff.

"Griff?" Candy watched in shock as the color drained from the youths face and for a moment he thought he even saw fear in his eyes.

"Hey, buddy, what is it?" Griff seemed to struggle at first, but suddenly he wore that shit eating grin Candy knew too well. The bigger it got, the more Griff could hid behind it.

"Had a little accident in the corral this morning." He looked at Candy with this smile for a while. The smile which told everybody he was doing good, a little too good even. Which could fool everybody, if they just saw it long enough. But Candy wasn´t everybody.

"An accident?" Candy scanned Griff's face attentively

"How bad?"

"Some bruises." The smile remained.

"Doc had a look at it?"

"No, Lukas. Stuck to me like a damn hen. You´re sure you got nothing to do with that?" Griff asked.

Candy´s lips stretched themselves into a grin

"No idea what you´re talking about."

He wanted to help Griff back to his feet, but the boy shooed his hands away and gingerly got up from the barrel.

"Just bruises, huh?"

"Didn´t say they don't hurt."

"Bruises my ass." Candy scrubbed a hand over his face. If he had it his way he would have packed Griff on the buggy and dragged him to town. The way he knew this kid, he hadn´t told the half of what really went on which made Candy wonder about how much he was told?

The rumbling sound of thunder overhead reminded him that the bridge would be unpassable by now, so every thought of bringing Griff to the doctor was just a waste of time.

"How was the trip?" asked Griff. He managed to haul himself up from the manger and flash an even bigger grin.

"Good." Candy retorted staring grimly at the youth.

Only for a brief second hurt feelings clouded Griff´s features, but it passed just as quickly as it came.

Great, exactly what Candy didn't want, so he quickly added

"Sorry, yes, it was quiet good."

Griff´s answer was interrupted by a squeaking as the small side door opened. Lucas got himself out of the rain and swore extensively.

"Evening." He greeted and marched through the barn to the back end where the supply stacks were kept.

"Just need some of, ah, there they are."

He griped himself an arm full of battens and came back.

"Goliath fell through the barn roof." He said, as if it explained everything.

"What was he doing on the barn roof?" Griff asked with a curious look at the battens.

"Hoisting his long johns." Lucas said deadly serious.

"His what?" snapped Griff.

"Ask him yourself. I guess he kind of enjoys the attention. And I really haven´t the time for explaining." Lucas said but then grinned.

"I could use a hand though"

"I´ll help. I´m soaked through already." Candy interjected. He sensed Griff´s answer before the boy gave it and send him a warning glare.

"You get to your bed." He muttered as he squashed through the door behind Lucas. He lightly let one hand rest on Griff´s shoulders on the way out.

"I know, you don´t need to. And I´m a pain in the ass, but do it so I don´t fall off the roof worrying about it, alright?" Candy squeezed Griff´s shoulder assuring.

"All the way back I looked forward to beating you in a game of checkers. So don´t think you can get out of it because of some blue spots."

Griff nodded and watched the two leaving. Feeling somehow lighter, now Candy was back.

~0~

Hoss gazed over the party who crowded in front of him. The huge wooden table had been set. There was steak, green beans, boiled carrots, mashed potatoes, white bread and a creamy, dark sauce. There was wine too. Which Hoss knew nothing about, but enjoyed nevertheless. And he could look forward to Hop Sings famous apple pie.

In the enormous fireplace, which dominated the living quarters, the flames crackled and filled the room with their cozy warmth.

It could have been a pleasant evening.

But there were two very stiff gentlemen sitting at the table, doing their very best to get everything wrong. Of course it had been bad timing. Goliaths long Johns, Adams dung, Jeffrey's fall in the nettles and the ranch hands fooling around, it just came together. But that's the way it was. The quirks of the people living and working on a Ranch made it what it was. So what was the point in this whole shebang?

"I heard you´re not natively from America?" Adam asked, in a visibly strained attempt to loosen up the atmosphere.

Mr. Strack turned towards Adam, the fork, loaded with green beans, paused between his plate and his mouth.

"That's accurate. How do you know?"

Adam nodded to him.

"My father mentioned it before he set off. You´re from Germany, am I right?"

A smile spread over the face of the cultivated, well-groomed little man

"Ah Yes. Das alte Land. Your forests remind me a little of it, you know?"

"Really?" Joe interjected.

"Sure." Mr. Strack lowered the fork back to his plate

"I was born in a diminutive town in one of the poorest, but most beautiful regions you can imagine. It was the land of my grandmother, and the land that raised me. But there was no work, no future. Not like here. So I left. I worked as a seaman to pay for my passage. I lost my home, but I found a friend. Isn´t that right Mr. Schmied?"

Mr. Schmied nodded, while he chewed.

"I´m quite interested in languages." Adam moved on as he cut his steak.

"Unfortunately, till now, no opportunity afforded itself for me to master German."

Mr. Strack beamed

"We will have you gabbling in no time. What about we start with something for the home use? For example: ´Dieses Hemd steht mir gar nicht´"(This shirt doesn't flatter me at all).

Adam repeated the sentence, and Mr. Strack made some minor remarks about the pronunciation.

"What does it mean?" Adam asked.

"It´s like a greeting for an old friend. Nice but maybe a bit old-fashioned."

Mr. Schmidt, still chewing, nodded his agreement.

"And how do you say: We are happy to have you here on our ranch?" asked Hoss.

"Well that's a bit tougher I suppose. But it would be something like: ´Ich gehöre zu den größten Dummköpfen dieser Ranch."

(I´m one of the biggest simpleton on this ranch.)

Hoss repeated the sentence and Mr. Strack nodded, smiling.

"But more useful at the moment would be: ´Ihr Trottel versteht gottseidank wirklich nichts. Das hilft uns außerordentlich."

(You morons really don´t understand a word. That will be extraordinary useful for us.) he said as Hop Sing entered the room to refill the bowls.

Mr. Strack looked around expectantly, his looks were answered with polite interest.

"What does it mean?" Joe asked finally.

Mr. Strack affably turned to the youngest

"It means: We can count ourselves lucky to attend such a delicious meal." While he talked he righted his cravat, which was the exact same color as his suit.

Hop Sing beamed and even Bens shoulders toned visibly, he raised his glass and announced,

"I would like to propose a toast to our guests. Perhaps you may be able to teach us one from the old country?"

Mr. Strack nodding amiably, also raised his glass and said.

"Mögen unsere Feinde in uns Freunde sehen, bis zum Tag ihres Todes (May our enemies see friends in us, till the day they die) – May our enemies become friends and may our friends live forever." Translated Mr. Strack. The dinner party returned the toast.

The remaining part of the dinner became a more lively affair and after the apple pie and a glass of brandy the two German Gents excused themselves to enjoy the magnificent night air for some minutes before going to bed.

Ben watched them leaving with the definitive hope that first impressions wouldn´t be as important as he feared.

~0~

The bunkhouse was still crowded, so Griff just took the time to grab his coat and the chaser quilt. The ground behind the barn, where he normally slept beneath one of the old trees, had changed to a mud puddle. So he laid his quilt in a covered corner of the veranda near the main house. He lowered himself down on the planks and stretched his legs. His upper body supported by the massive wooden walls of the house he listened to the night. It was pleasantly quiet, only the comforting sound of rain lingering in the air. Griff cherished the cool night air and closed his eyes.

Slowly his body started to relax, the sharp tearing in his back and shoulders subsiding to a dull pressure. After awakening in the bunkhouse he couldn´t believe he slept in the first place. At first he thought that if he just kept going his body would right itself. It had worked a couple of times in prison and with his father. No he interrupted himself- so not going there.

But this time it didn´t seem he would get that lucky.

He couldn´t afford the luxury of being under observation. He had… stuff to do. He slid a little to ease the strain on his right thigh and panted as a furious pain ripped through the leg. Perhaps he hadn´t a choice in the matter what so ever.

Candy was the only thing his muddled brain came up with. Perhaps he should tell him. This idea had been discussed and dismissed some time ago thank you very much. At the moment would the rain prevent them working and give him some much needed time to heal?. The Cartwrights wouldn't lose too much because of his clumsiness. He smiled. After being nothing but trouble at the start now this storm became more and more of a friend.

He coughed and needed ten full minutes to be able to focus on something outside of his body. Talk to Candy. Old but gold. He would talk to Candy. As soon as he finished this barn roof. To be honest the effort of getting up and walking over suddenly seemed too much. Candy would find him. He had promised to. Till then he would just sit tight and listen to this beautiful rain.

~0~

Schmied and Strack settled into two of the comfortable seats on the terrace. Schmied pulled out a silver etui and withdraw a cigarette from it, while Strack lit a nut wooden pipe. They smoked in silence for a couple of minutes their silhouettes illuminated by the oil lamp on the desk.

Then Strack said:

"Sie verstehen es wirklich nicht. Glück für uns. "(They really don´t understand us. We are so lucky.)

Schmied grinned: "Wie artig sie alles wiederholt haben." (How well-behaved they repeated everything.) He blew blue smoke out into the rain.

" Meinst du nicht, es war riskant? Wenn sie es vor jemand anderem wiederholen?" (Don´t you think it was risky? What if they rerun those phrases in front of someone else?)

"Wem sollten sie es hier sagen? Und selbst wenn irgendjemand diese Sprache spricht, wird er denken sie hätten etwas verwechselt." (To whom should they talk? And even if somebody out here speaks the language, they will simply assume they made a mistake.) he puffed away on his pipe, a satisfied expression on his face.

" Diese Ranch ist ein Tollhaus. Gerade richtig für uns. Als dieser Idiot seine Unterhosen gehisst hat hätte ich fast gejubelt. Hier könnten wir einen der Söhne um Mitternacht vom Scheunendach werfen und man würde uns jede Ausrede abnehmen." (This ranch is a bedlam. Perfect for us. When I saw that idiot hoisting his Long Johns I nearly started cheering. We could drop one of the sons from the barn roof around midnight. Nobody would suspect a thing.)

Schmied shook his head:" Nicht jeder. Dieser Älteste. Er ist schlau." (Not nobody. The oldest one. He is smart.)

"Mag sein. Aber Leichen sind nicht allzu gut darin ihre Intelligenz zu nutzen." (A corpse maybe has a brain, but how should he use it?)

"Wann sollen wir anfangen?" (At which time should we start?) Schmied asked.

"Noch nicht. Das Wetter ist zu schlecht für eine Abreise. Außerdem hätte ich gerne einen glaubhaften Unfall. Zum Beispiel ein Hangrutsch. Auf dem Weg zu unseren neuen Mienen. Keiner Untersucht Körper auf Gift deren Schädel eingeschlagen sind." (Not now. The weather is too bad to leave. And I want a proper accident. Perhaps a landslide on the way to our new mines. No one will examine a body for toxin if the head is smashed in.) Strack hummed, pleased.

Both brooded silently for some time.

Behind them someone sneezed. Schmied got up and walked some steps in the dark. Suddenly he lunged at something in the shadows. There was a struggle and he returned into the light with a Youth who he pushed into one of the chairs.

"Saß dahinten doch tatsächlich einfach in der Ecke." (He was just sitting in the corner.) He mustered the black mop of hair with suspicion.

"Was hattest du da zu suchen?" (What are you doing here?) Strack asked.

The Youth frowned.

" What? I… I´m sorry if I disturbed you, I just wanted to nap… the ground is dry over here." his face split in a huge, apologizing smile.

Now Strack looked at him re-evaluating.

"Never mind. We were just surprised. You are one of the hands?" Strack smiled disarmingly.

"Yes, Sir." Griff wanted to get up, but Schmied held him in the chair.

"Where have you worked before?"

"Here´n´there."

"So you´re pretty new?"

"Pretty." Griff nodded, looking from one to the other.

"You like the work?"

"Yes."

"Du fühlst dich zu Hause?" (You feel at home here?)

"Ja?" (Yes)

"Wie heißt du?" (What´s your name?)

"Griff."

Strack's questions got faster, giving Griff less time to think. He realized his mistake too late.

Strack´s smile became genuine.

" I thought so." He emptied his pipe and began to stuff it again.

" Where did you learn German?"

Griff remained silent. Suddenly he felt cool metal brush against his neck. He closed his eyes and as he opened them again his chair was no longer standing on wooden planks. He could feel the pressed clay beneath his feet, hear the barking of the guard's three cells away and the screams of terrified inmates. He stared into Strack´s eyes. Eyes he remembered. He had seen them hundreds of times. Eyes of a murderer. You couldn´t explain it. But something in them changed. If you have seen them once you would recognize them everywhere. Griff felt his hackles rise.

"But Mr. Schmied, take down this weapon. I´m confident we won´t need it with this gifted young gentleman. Not after he knows, what we are. He surly would like to have a nice friendly chat with us, if we promise not to go in the house and shoot the Cartwright's right in their beds. Wouldn´t he?" Strack lit his pipe and drew on it self-indulgently.

"It would have been too loud."

"Pardon me?" asked Strack, still stuck in his affable ways.

"It would be too loud to shoot them." Griff repeated. He wouldn´t plead for mercy or justice. Or, how ridiculous, appeal to their better nature. He had grown up between people who would torture for entertainment and suddenly this came handy. His mind became perfectly calm. He couldn´t afford to panic or lose his temper, it would get friends killed.

"You would wake everybody. And I would assume they're not long in bed."

"Oh dear boy. There is more than one weapon with a trigger, and not all of them produce any noise."

"It would be dumb. At dawn their bodies would be found and you would have problems explaining." Griff said firmly. " There is a bunkhouse full of guys. You can´t kill them all."

Strack nodded " Accurate. Jetzt sag mir. Wo hast du Deutsch gelernt?" (Now tell me: where did you learn German?)

"Bin als Kind häufiger Mal an einen deutschen Rancher ausgeliehen worden." (I have been rented to a German farmer for some time.) Griff focus on Strack, still trying to work out if it would pay out to scream, even if he would get shot for it.

"Ausgeliehen worden?" (Rented to)

Strack said and brought his lips forward, then began to smile.

"Du hast völlig Recht. Wir können die Cartwrights noch nicht töten. Aber" (Your right, we couldn´t kill the Cartwrights now. But...)

Schmied needed less than a second to let the gun slip through his hand, grab the barrel and hit the handle against the back of Griff´s head. He just needed one hand to prevent Griff´s body from sliding on to the floor.

"Wir können sie nicht warenen lassen." (We couldn´t let them be warned.)

Schmied tucked the gun away.

" Wir könne ihn nicht hier umbringen." (We can´t leave him here.)

„Nein. Können wir nicht." (No. We certainly can´t), Strack´s smile stayed unchanged.

"Wir sind doch über diesen fantastischen Fluss gefahren. Man sollte meinen ein Bewusstloser würde in diesem Wasser nicht überleben." (We came over this marvelous river. One should assume an unconscious person will not survive such a water.)

"Gefällt mir nicht." (I don´t like it.)

Schmied growled. " Warum es nicht richtig erledigen." (Why not do it properly.)

"Weil ich will, dass sie seine Leiche finden." (Because I want them to find his corps.)

Strack patted the shoulder of his associate reassuringly. " Eine Leiche, die bei einem Unfall gestorben ist. Ich möchte nicht hören, dass hier ein Mörder frei rumläuft. Am Ende zweifelt man so an anderen Unfällen." (The young man died in an accident. I don´t want to hear anything about a murderer on the lose around here. In the end it will make all accidents suspicious.)

Schmieds face remained expressionless." Ich finde es immer noch besser…" (I still don't know….)

"Dann gib ihm noch einen Über den Schädel, bevor du ihn ins Wasser wirfst." (So smash his scull before throwing him in the river.)

Strack rose from his chair. " Ich werde mal zusehen, ob ich solange nicht ein bisschen Ärger machen kann." (I´ll try and cause some interferences.)


	4. Chapter 4

Fixing the roof had been horrible work. Candy hadn't the foggiest idea how it happened, but there had been a Goliath shaped hole in the shingles.

And Candy didn't even want to get started on the proudly blowing Long Johns.

In any case after they darned the hole none of them had any dry clothes left.

He had let himself in the main house through the backdoor, firstly because he didn´t wanted to make a bigger mess than necessary and secondly because he didn´t want to bother the stiff gentleman with a dripping wet Forman. If the silence from the living room was any indicator, things weren´t so great already.

Candy peeled himself out of the wet clothes, found a clean shirt and, oh glory, dry and mud free pants. After feeling nearly human again he made his way back down.

Surprisingly there were just the Cartwright's draped over the various upholstery around the fireplace, but the stiff gentleman were nowhere to be seen.

Hoss noted Candy's entry first and raised his glass to him.

"They're in bed already, the gents." He grinned.

"A little too much fresh air."

This earned him a dubious glance from his father:" I guess you and your brothers should take them as an example. I will surly." He got up and looked expectant at his sons. The three men blinked in unison, processing the fact that they have been send to bed.

Candy coughed dutiful to drown out his laughter, then quickly excused himself to check on Griff, the way he promised.

~0~

The bunkhouse was winding down for the night. Some of the guys still sat around the table playing cards and Goliath told a crowd of hands about his fight with the storm, very dramatically and with a generous amount of flailing.

Candy´s face darkened as he spotted the huddled up bundle on Griff´s bed. He quickly climbed the ladder to the upper bunk and laid a hand on the cover.

"Hey Griff? Buddy, you all right?"

Nothing moved. With a new wave of concern Candy scrambled another rung, braced his weight on the mattress and tried to get a look at Griff´s face. Suddenly the bed gave in.

In a clutter of covers, the ropes, which were originally supposed to hold the mattress and because of some weird reason shoes Candy rushed to the lower bed. Jeering flashed up around him while he tried to get out of the chaos. He heard Dusty´s voice through the serenity.

"Sorry Candy. Had completely forgotten about that." As Candy finally stood again Dusty was busy wiping tears of laughter from his eyes.

He caught a glance of Candy´s face and immediately sobered up. The last time Candy had that look a cattle rustler had hung.

"Look, I´m really sorry. How should I have known that you would climb up there?" Dusty defended himself.

Candy had his arms crossed in front of his chest and his answer was very explicit.

"Did you want to kill the boy?"

Dusty paled.

"What you talking about? What boy? Griff? Hell no. It was a joke. He would have just fallen on the other bed. That's all."

Somehow helpless he pointed to the mess on the bunk.

"You know he had an accident this morning?"

The little color that had been on Dusty´s face vanished as he rummaged through his memories of the day. Griff had sat on Lucas bunk as Dusty came in. He hadn´t paid much attention to the youth and after his discussion with Goliath ha had no recollection of seeing him in the shack again. Perhaps he had looked somehow battered. He had no idea.

"Accident?"

"Yep. Had been dragged through the corral. Had a hard time standing."

Dusty´s White face became a green tint

"I didn´t know. Really. I would never – Look, it was this way since this morning. We prepared it after he stormed out, after he…"

"After he what?" snapped Candy.

"I was supposed to be a jest." Dusty said weakly.

"What was supposed to be a jest?"

"We just… tied a rope around the bed posts. God. That's all. He fell and then he left."

"And you got nothing better to do, then cut the ropes on his bunk?" Candy had gotten dangerously calm.

"How should we have known…?" Jones started.

That made Candy turn on his heels

"Should have known, how long has this been going on?" he stuck his index finger in Dusty´s direction.

"He wasn´t there, but you were Jones. You can recall the last time you started with this s***. Jenkins nearly lost his arm because ´you didn´t think about that... Doggone!"

Jones had bristled at Candy´s outburst and now kept his eyes on the tips of his boots. Despite his size he felt like a small boy.

"Where is he now?" Candy asked, the horrible picture of Griff in his mind, lying somewhere. Because he was feared of finding a Rattler in his bed. Just for fun.

There was silence.

A door hinge squeaked and Lucas strolled in.

He still wore his soaked rain coat and some wood chips were tangled in his hair. His eyes rested on the huge pile of junk on Griff's bed. "This was really necessary?"

"You know where he is?" Candy interrupted him.

"Who?" Lucas asked perplexed. Only now he sensed the strange atmosphere in the bunkhouse.

"Griff."

Something clicked behind Lucas forehead as he looked at Candy, he shook his head.

"Patched him up this noon, slept a little in my bed. Didn´t wanted him to climb up to his bunk."

Automatically he began pulling the wood chips out of his hair.

"You saw him like, an hour ago. Remember?" he flipped off a splinter.

"He disappears a lot." Lucas said, "Likes to sleep outside. Something wrong?"

He then added.

"I know he was groggy, but..."

Candy watched Lucas face turn from thoughtfulness to concern which was replaced by worry.

"Dusty, you clean this mess up. And the others better get dressed, because we will search until we find him." The expected grumbling on Candy´s orders failed to appear. Just quick steps and slapping of heavy coats could be heard as the boys got ready.

"Where does he normally goes to?" Candy hated the fact that he had to ask that.

Lucas shrugged. "To the trees behind the barn. But it´s all flooded by now."

He wrinkled his forehead and asked,

"You don´t think he could have just found himself a nice dry spot?" in his voice resonated something like desperate hope.

Candy could still feel the fury pumping through his veins,

"You should have seen him in the barn. Something is up!"

And you idiots chase him wherever you can get a hold on him, said a bitterly voice in his head.

"I didn´t think it was bad. I mean, they do that with every new guy. He seemed to handle it well." Lucas started.

"He always seems to handle things well. He wouldn´t speak up. You know that."

Lucas flinched as if Candy had punched him.

Candy shook his head "I shouldn´t have let him off the hook so easily. I should have made him talk to me. Not climb on this damn roof. But I thought he… I don´t know, needed a minute?"

"Hey, it´s my fault too." Lucas tried to appease.

Candy didn´t react. He had hung his head and concentrated on Dusty cleaning the bed. Expressionless he said.

"Get them to split up. Search around the house, the forest around the stables, everywhere it could be dry enough to sleep. I´m going to the trift behind the main house, the summer flock is there, but it might be dry enough."

Candy opened the door and looked into a huge, very timorous face. The animal let loose a deep resonating sound.

"What is that cow doing there?" Lucas asked.

"Not being behind the main house any longer. Damn!"

Candy pushed the frightened animal aside and suddenly stood in the middle of a herd.

"They tore down the creel." He shouted into the bunkhouse.

More faces appeared in the open door. There was calling and whistling as the man swarmed out and efficiently started to round up the cattle. But Candy wouldn´t give in to illusions, the animals were panicky, it would take hours to find them all. All he could do until then was hope that Griff hadn´t been in their way.

~0~

Schmied hated this god forsaken part of the world. He hated the west. He hated Cowboys. He hated this weather and he fervently abhorred the word "howdy".

But he was a professional. He wouldn´t allow anything to collide with his job, Sweet Fanny Adams!

Even if it meant making a fool out of him for three straight weeks. He would be paid well for it. But as he dragged himself up the stairs he wondered if a nice, descend job wouldn´t have been better. Bank robber, like his father, or cardsharper like his grandma.

But no. He was a professional killer. And as a professional he was able to get into a house without being seen. Piece of art with all these cows running around. Everybody was way too busy screaming at them. He had stood directly next to the stairs in the living room as two of the three dozy Cartwright sons trotted past him. He simply had kept in the shadows, and they never spent any view on him.

In their room Strack was waiting for him. The room was spacious and really comfortably furnished. But Strack's presence made it seem official. Everything Strack touched seemed official. Strack incarnated integrity. Everything with him was serious and reliable, and if he did the most absurd things, he always did them with great confidence. So they always ended up being serious and reliable.

Strack had been his lucky find.

They worked together for about thirty years and they were the best in what they did. Every one of their customers would agree. Well… their contracting authorities at least.

But this night had been cursed. Schmied tried to calm himself, while he hobbled through the room and let himself sink into one of the armchairs.

Strack watched him thoughtfully and handed him a glass filled with an amber colored liquor. Schmied took it. It was Whisky. Of course they would have Whisky in the guest rooms. Another liquid nuisance. He drank it either way.

" _Do we have Problems_?" Strack asked and Schmied shook his head.

He proceeded talking in their native German tongue. Even if the Cartwright's did overhear them, they could never hope to understand what was being said. Next to this advantage it was something that reminded them of home, good memories and better days. So they kept it as a habit, to ground them.

" _I don't think so._ " he picked at his shredded trouser leg. Some scrapes, nothing serious. A twisted ankle perhaps.

" _What happened_?" Strack seated himself on the leather chair opposite from Schmied. He crossed his legs and looked as if he just asked him something about market development.

" _Took him back to the bridge. Thought I let him wash away by the river. So you would get your „all natural corps"._ _Till then everything went well. Had the rock ready to smash his head, suddenly a loud bang_." Schmied colored the story with gestures.

" _The flood must have taken a wood deposit. Gigantic trunks. First they just gathered at the pile, but within seconds the embankments were ruptured. I was only a breath away from a refreshing bath._ "

Schmied finished his drink and added,

" _I don´t know if he was still alive as I left the bridge._ "

None of them mentioned that in this night their partnership nearly had been canceled by a higher force. Strack was a professional, too. He opened his suitcase and removed a robust leather bag:" _Show me the leg._ ", Schmied obeyed.

" _You think he did survive?_ " Asked Strack while he got to work.

Schmied pondered for a moment,

" _I´ve never seen anything like this river. It played with the trunks as if they were matches._ "

He took a deep breath.

" _I really can´t tell. I would have to say no."_

„ _But you aren´t sure_ ", asked Strack and cleaned the scrapes on his companions leg.

" _I´m not. But I´m paranoid about such things._ "

" _Indeed you are._ " Strack agreed and tied up the neatly bandaged leg, he stood up and refilled Schmied´s glass.

" _Drink up and go to bed. He is dead. At least for tonight._ "

Schmied hummed acquiescing. He had leaned back in the arm chair and watched Strack out of tired eyes:" _With whom do we start?_ "

Strack loosened his cravat. He untangled the knot and said,

" _The youngest first, the father last. He should watch his family die._ "

Schmied emptied his glass and put it on the side table.

" _We work for some wicked people._ "

Strack chuckled and took off his vest.

" _You always get so melodramatic when you are overtired._ " He helped him out of the chair.

" _Only when I have someone drowning._ "

„ _Nothing successfully._ "

„ _Nobody has that._ "

" _Let´s hope so._ "

Strack wrapped his ultramarine Robe over his shirt and trousers, pulled out his socks and winked at his companion.

" _The hair._ " Schmied said quietly while he lowered himself on the bed.

Strack tousled his carefully pomaded hairdo and stroked them back in shape not very successfully. He looked at Schmied with a questioning raised eyebrow.

He gave him a thump up.

" _Sleep, I´ll take care of this._ " Strack said.

He rubbed his eyes for a minute, proceeded to open the door and vanished to the hall.

~0~

It didn´t take long to wake up the Cartwrights. They appeared, one after the other, all in very different stages of undress.

Joe wore a mixture of nightshirt, boots and his green coat. He and Dusty had tried, quiet hard, to make one of the cow's leave the porch. Momentarily he had his back pressed against the cow, the feet stemmed on the railings, so that his whole body was braced in midair. His face was twisted with strain as Hoss made his way out of the door. In his nightshirt, but with his hat on. He sleepily scratched his belly and in passing grabbed the prominent horn of the animal. He pulled it with him, without any signs of effort.

The cow roared scandalized, but didn´t have any other choice than to follow Hoss. There was a sound of a man in triumph, then a sudden scream and a thud.

Dusty started laughing whiningly.

Hoss abandoned the cow and turned.

Joe laid flat on his back, arms crossed, his leg tangled in the railing.

"What", Hoss interrupted himself for a hearty yawn,

„Are you doing there? Not really the time for fooling around."

Without a thought behind it he shoved another cow in the right direction.

Adam came out of the door, later than his brothers, but fully dressed, even in a rain coat. He stepped on the porch and had a look around. He then freed Joe's leg with one grip and pulled him to his feet.

„Get dressed. We're gonna move the herd to the trift. When you are ready go and check the fences first, afterwards come and help us. But the fences first. We're not chasing them around again tonight." With that he jerked up his coat collar and went out into the rain.

Joe mimicked him, but went up to put on his trousers.

He met his father in the hall, who was trying to reason with a blearily eyed Mr. Strack. He was wrapped in his night gown and seemed to have just crawled out of bed.

Ben noticed his youngest and waved him over.

„What is this all about, Joe?"

"The summer herd tore down the fences Pa. The Hands are on it."

Behind him he heard Hoss disappearing into his room.

„Hoss and I are gonna have a look at the fences."

"Is there a way we can help?" Mr. Strack asked, rubbing his eyes.

"I don´t think that will be necessary." Ben stated.

„I guess it would be for the best if you just go back to bed. Chasing after cattle in the night is something I really don´t want a guest on the Ponderosa doing. I would feel a lot better if I knew you were comfortable in your beds."

Mr. Strack seemed a little huffy, but nodded thin-lipped and disappeared into his room without another word.

Ben sighed. „I will get dressed quickly."

Joe watched his father and tried to calculate his chances of making him go back to bed too.

Thanks to a nearly telepathic connection Ben developed with his sons he called over his shoulder.

"Don´t even think about it." before returning to his room.

~0~

They chased after cows for the most of the night. The good thing was, that they covered the main house and the area around it. The bad thing was, they didn´t find Griff. They found his old blanket at the side of the porch, but nothing else.

Candy shut the gate and scowled over to the buildings.

He had send the other men back to their beds. No use in running them into the ground by letting them work day and night. The night and the rain had cooled his temper down and left him with a feeling of vague anxiety.

Griff had always shown up at breakfast, at least to get his work orders for the day. That's the exact amount of time Candy was willing to wait. Perhaps he was driving himself mad. The boy had survived up until now, in much more dangerous environments than the Ponderosa.

He wiped over his rain-slicked face and startled violently as someone behind him said,

"You didn´t found him either?"

Candy turned around to Lucas ashen face.

He shook his head and Lucas swore. His eyes flicked, sheepishly to the wooden planks of the floor avoiding Candy's penetrating gaze.

"What?"

Lucas looked as if he knew a lot nicer places than under Candy´s burning glares – a comfy active volcano for example.

"I talked with all the guys." He started but stopped to listen to the rolling thunder, "And Griff… He… well, it looks like he has been..."

"Steals long johns? Got Goliath's teeth for a saddle horn? Secretly paints the horses? What?"

"He borrowed money." Lucas stated quietly, what ridiculously just let the matter appear far more sever,

"A lot of money. From literally everyone. Even asked Hoss for an advance. Me too, this noon. Gave him everything I´ve got on me. This alone was 50 Dollars."

What he didn´t say was: They believe it. All of them. Take the money and run.

He also didn´t talk about the sheriff they would have to inform sooner or later. About violated conditions of probation. About warrants with Griff's name on them. But Candy heard it.

How could he have been this occupied? How could he have let the boy – No. He wouldn´t believe it. It wasn´t like Griff. He wasn´t stupid. A couple of years here and he would have been a free man. A couple of years on a ranch with men who nearly crippled him, just for fun. No. He didn´t run. He wouldn´t. He would have talked to Candy. Would have said something. He would have been… different.

But he had been different. A gnawing voice in Candy's head said. Something had been up and you haven´t been listening. You went on a journey. A vacation. And when you came back, you stayed with him? No, you went up this damn roof.

Frustrated he kicked at the fence.

"If he had wanted to run..." Lucas started.

"You really want to finish this sentence?" Candy called at him.

Lucas raised his hands placatory,

"I don´t say he did it. All I say is, if he had wanted to run, he would have taken his horse with him."

That made Candy shut up.

After some seconds he asked,

"Thunder is still here?"

"Yep, in his box, looking mean as ever. Griff wouldn´t b*** off on foot now, would he?"

"Let´s wait. Perhaps he´ll show up around breakfast." Candy said, determined to stay calm.

Lucas cuffed him on the back reassuringly.

"Sure he will." He said with more confidence than he felt.

He made his way back to the bunkhouse to at least get some dry clothes until he would have to start his day for good. A day either filled with hard work on the ranch, or a search for a missed friend.

Candy gloomily stared at the now neatly crammed cattle until he couldn´t hear Lucas anymore,

"And pigs do fly." He growled.


	5. Chapter 5

The Ponderosa was under water. At least half a meter. There simply was no other reason why his bed could have been this wet. He had seen the river after the rain and it all made sense once you came to think about it.

There were mountains on both sides, and there had been so much water. Surely it had been damming somewhere and now the valley was filling up. Soon there would be nothing above the water.

Well not nothing. Candy's bed, for example. He had his room on the first floor of the main house.

Candy could sleep drily.

That was nice for him.

And real unfair, too.

Griff splashed a little, just for fun. Hopefully the guys had woken up before they drowned. His hand bumped at some pebbles. He started playing with them, before he realised how strange pebbles truly were.

They were smooth and white and they did not belong in the bunkhouse.

No they really didn´t.

He sat up. That appeared to be a bad idea, because he somehow was wrongly put together. He palpated his arms and noted relieved that they were attached appropriately. If he had working arms he could figure out everything else.

First the legs. Legs… one moment. Yes, there was one. This seemed all right. It even moved.

The other one seemed a little odd. The foot was somehow wrong. He turned it and automatically slapped at the animal. It had to be quite large and it was biting in his ankle. It would be nice if it would stop that.

It hurt profoundly.

His foot pointed in the right direction again.

But it didn´t feel right.

Stupid animal.

He hitched himself up at the trunk, he had been leaning against before.

Another thing that didn't belong here.

He looked around. The flood must have changed the Ponderosa landscape more than he would have expected. It nearly looked like… the place by Willers Creek. But that was one day away from the main house. Perhaps the Ponderosa had been washed away and was somewhere else now.

He sighed, how should he find it, when he had no idea where he was?

Also he couldn´t remember all these logs that were piling up around him. How did they get there?

At least it wasn't raining. The sky was still grey and the storm was still looming. It drizzled very slightly, but the heavy drumming downpour had finally stopped.

This meant they would go on working the horses today. If they hadn´t been driven away with everything else.

With clumsy steps and his legs twisting now and then he stumbled over the river bank to the hedges. They sprawled down to the shore so Griff was able to get a firm grip on them and hoist himself up.

In thought he was already at breakfast. He was incredibly hungry. Hopefully Hop Sings kitchen was still there. In particular for Hoss´s sake.

The last piece of the way he crawled on his belly. His head pierced through the leaves and he sneaked a peek of the underwood.

Perhaps he would search for his breakfast longer than he thought. Who knew where the house had drifted to.

He staggered out of the bushes and made it to a tree, he leaned heavily against it. Heavens he felt old all of a sudden. He couldn´t even climb out of a dip without needing a break. And he had just gotten up. Good thing the Cartwright's couldn´t see him like this. They would surely fire him.

Indecisive he looked around and noticed a huge, dark figure approaching him slowly.

It's long drawn-out snout was raised in the air scenting and his vast paws scraped over the trees left and right. It moved upright which made his head brush against low hanging branches.

It really was an exceedingly beautiful bear, Griff thought, he would tell Hoss about it. Hoss was always interested in such things.

Dreamy, he watched the animal come nearer. His thick fur shimmered even here in the darkness of the forest and the storm. He really was beautiful.

Griff let himself slide down against a tree, to get more comfortable, while he kept observing.

Something in his mind desperately tried to get his attention. It was like… a name you tried to remember, it laid on the tip of your tongue. It was important. But it wouldn´t come clear to him.

The bear was so near he could see his teeth. Big and yellow.

Ah, there it was! The animal would presumably eat him.

He smiled satisfied with himself.

Suddenly adrenalin pumped through his body and drove the dawn out of his head. In a matter of seconds he was standing.

But together with this realization his whole body had woken. With his first step pain shot through his leg and let him cry out. More body parts answered with glaring fusillades and the forest around him started rocking dangerously. He felt his mind slam on the brakes, saw the darkness returning and was under before his motionless body hit the forest floor.

~0~

Ben Cartwright was a pretty good employer. He was honest and he cared about his workers. It wasn´t easy to get a job on the Ponderosa, but if you got one, you got one for life.

Candy had always been the big exception. He nearly was a part of the family. He slept in the main house and he ate with them.

Before he started working for the Cartwright's he had seen nearly every whistle-stop this side of the Mexican border. He had spent years searching for something that clearly laid just behind the next horizon.

Even today he had the freedom to leave at any time. Perhaps only this possibility made him stay. Candy understood Griff only too well. The obligation to stay at one place was reason enough to leave immediately. And Griff had spent half his life chained to places nobody would have stayed at voluntarily.

Therefore Candy waited till morning. Waited in the hopes that perhaps Griff would just, show up, irritated by all the buzz and ready to tackle the day. Waited in the hopes that this gnawing suspicion surrounding him would come to nothing. But after everybody had showed up for breakfast, even a little later than normal due to their busy night, there still was no sign of Griff King. Candy left the guys with their scrambled eggs to tell his Still- employer about a missing convict. Oh boy.

~0~

"I´m not sure what happened, but I don´t think he just spooked." Candy explained.

And again he was surprised by Mr. Cartwright, who put down his coffee cup and plainly said,

"Let´s search for him."

"You don´t think we should notify the sheriff?" asked Mr. Strack from the other side of the breakfast table.

"No. Not now. There can be many reasons why. He could come rolling in sometime today and we would have driven half Virginia City crazy just because of a sprained ankle." he patted Candy´s arm reassuringly and added,

"I have witnessed Griff during a lot of situations. But he never ran. Gather the hands, all of them. It´s bright and early, we will see what we can do, we will find him."

With the guys from the bunkhouse, the entire Cartwright clan, Hop Sing and the two stiff Gentleman, who had insisted on helping, they were nearly 25 people who stumbled through the rain, hollering Griff´s name.

Two at a time they were split to search in different directions. They searched excessively. Looked down hills, into hollows, cut their way through the undergrowth and waded across flooded fields. Everywhere, where a carless wanderer could end up. They searched so thorough, they found Goliath's pocket watch, which he lost a month ago while mending fences.

The search went on most of the day and let them spread widely over the area.

Dusk had set in as Lucas and Candy met Joe, Adam, Hoss and Ben near the river. They hadn't found anything and now they stood in the reinforced roar of the storm.

"How far could he get?" asked Hoss and let his eyes wander over the countryside.

"Not much further than here." Murmured Lucas.

"What?" came from Joe, Cochise, his Palomino, pranced and he was visibly troubled trying to calm him.

Instead of answering Lucas pointed at the bridge. Well at the place where the bridge used to be. Only the torn out anchorages remained of the former ramp.

Candy cursed under his breath.

"Perhaps he stayed on this side." Lucas said, but it was obvious that he didn´t believe in his own words.

Candy stared at the river. A surging mass of glistening black water. He saw parts of the north fence dancing upon it.

"We should go back…" began Mr. Cartwright, but sighed as he eyed Candy´s rigid form. He let his horse trip until it came to a stop next to Candy´s.

"Mr. Cartwright." Began Candy, his eyes glued to the black river,

"You remember our agreement?"

"Hold your horses there." The patriarch answered,

"I didn´t say we would abort the search. But we are all exhausted. Nobody brought a bed roll."

"I have." Said Candy still without looking at his employer.

"To be exact, I have too." Came from Joe, who had finally gotten a hold on his horse.

Hoss waved with his roll.

Adam observed his brothers with a frown,

"It this some kind of a plot?"

Lucas shrugged and lashed the knot on his roll.

"I haven't asked for nothing." Candy said immediately.

"You didn´t had to." Joe had rowed up next to his father,

"You don´t need us during this rain. We would just crowd the house and drive everybody crazy. Let us search a little, say two or three days. What´s the harm in that?"

"We're playing host to business partners who want to participate in our mines. How do you expect this to settle?" Mr. Cartwright asked sharply.

"I don´t know nothing about mines." Hoss noted "Let Adam stay. He studied all about it."

Mr. Cartwright saw into four determined and one fretful face.

"I can´t stop you." His brows furred as he added,

"And I won't hide the fact that I feel better knowing you're searching for him. Something about this whole story is odd."

Mr. Cartwright considered Joe and Hoss with a quick glance, "You two take care of yourself. I don´t want to form a rescue squad to search for you."

Both nodded.

He turned to Candy, " You will come back, if you don´t find him?" he asked.

Another man would have been insulted, but Candy heard what hadn´t been said: You can come back. Anytime. You keep searching, if you need to. We will be here.

It was a calm and completely serious question, which Candy, to his own surprise, couldn´t answer.

"I don´t know… Depending… depending on what I find."

Mr. Cartwright nodded sadly, "You´ll find him."

He patted Lucas on the shoulder and turned his horse. Adam on his heels.

The four riders watched the two horses scud away.

Candy was the first one to speak, "We should..."

"Your next words better not be split up." Hoss growled.

"Two and Two. Like before." Joe added.

"Better in this weather." Concluded Lucas.

Candy rumbled, "Adam is right, this is a plot."

~0~

It didn´t take Ben and Adam long to reach the ranch. It´s astonishing how much shorter a journey can be if you stop riding in circles and screaming names.

Most of the hands were back. Goliath and Dusty waited on the porch for news.

As Ben explained that they hadn´t found anything Dusty´s face petrified. It seems like he would blame himself personally for not finding Griff. Ben realized it and began reassuring them. He told them about the others who would search in a wider range and that everybody would keep on searching tomorrow.

Adam waited until the two hands had wandered off before he asked, "What´s the game?"

"What do you mean?" his father asked back.

"As… what was his name, Dredgins? As he had fallen in the dip at Chasepeak we went straight to Virginia City and rallied the sheriff. We got nearly three hundred men and found that moron within half a day. Why aren´t we doing this now?"

"You have seen the bridge. There is no way of crossing that river." Ben started and then humbled along with a longer declaration about bad weather and dangerous traveling conditions.

Adam didn´t interrupt his father, he waited patiently and then said, "Candy told me he went missing yesterday evening. Perhaps there would have been a bridge at that time."

"You can´t know that. And he wasn't missing at that time. He was… just not there."

"Since when is it up to the hands to decide whether they want to go or come as they enjoy?"

"Adam, you have been away for a long time. You don´t know Griff." Ben´s voice remained calm.

"I don´t know Candy either." Adam leaned on one of the porch posts.

"What´s going on here?" as Ben didn't react Adam went on, "Did he shove off? Why don´t we ask for help? If he is hurt out there we are losing time."

Ben signed "I wish this was the problem."

"Come again?"

"Let us go in. I´m tired and this is a long story."

Adam thoughtfully watched his father enter the house. He took a couple of deep breaths before he followed him.

The living room was still brightly lit. The two stiff gents sat in front of the fireplace and let their cups refill from a generously pouring Hop Sing. They showed a picture of idyllic coziness.

Both in their robes sunken deeply into the cushions their feet stretched heat-seeking towards the flames.

When the door opened Hop Sing looked up from his task and put down the coffeepot. He approached them hopefully. As Ben shook his head Hop Sings face darkened. His whole appearance collapsed. The small man from China hadn´t selected his profession coincidentally. Caring was a deep part of his character. His big heart had become proverbial on the Ponderosa. He got up in the middle of the night to make tea if somebody fell ill, or cooked through a night on the track so everybody would have something fresh to take on the ride. But in particular it was the time he invested in everybody on the Ranch. He knew the name of parents, siblings and wives. Knew who was having a hard time and knew instinctively how to improve their day with small gestures. If he found out that a hand had a favorite dish, it would always make an appearance on his birthday. Mostly followed by a cake.

There were many hands on the Ponderosa. So there was a lot of cake too.

Like his employer he took part and took a share in their joys.

But today it made him bear the brunt of the world on his shoulders.

Ben added the weight of a soothing hand to it, the small man griped it involuntary and said,

"To cold. To long outside. Hop Sing makes new coffee. Nice and hot."

He made his way to the kitchen. Quiet and sad.

As Adam was capable of tearing himself away from the small cook Mr. Strack had already gotten up and held his hand out to his father, "We rode till we couldn´t see a thing."

He also, let his eyes linger on their faces,

"No news?" he asked.

Ben shook his head, "Nothing. But we will widen the radius. Hoss, Joe, Candy and Lucas stayed searching."

He scrubbed his face, feeling bone tired, "They will keep looking for him the next couple of days. Perhaps they´ll find something that we didn´t."

Mr. Strack looked like somebody who had a whole lot more to say about this topic but was clever enough not to do it.

Instead he just declared, "Mr. Schmied and I will withdraw for the night. We will see you all bright and early to continue searching."

Ben nodded and the two gents disappeared up the stairs.

Rain soaked coats were shed, mudded boots taken off. Finally the two Cartwrights settled down in front of the flames.

Ben ached all over, but he didn´t expect it differently. He had lead a various life. He had seen a lot, lived through a lot and even if he wasn´t always aware of it, his bones reminded him from time to time.

With a look on his son his aged infused wistfulness disappeared quickly. Adam too had his legs stretched, his upper body sunken in the arm chair and his feet were nearly in the fire, he looked like Ben felt.

Perhaps it wasn´t the age. Perhaps it just had been a very rough day.

Hop Sing returned with a freshly brewed pot. He poured them a cup and the odor of coffee filled the room.

"Stay with us, please." Said Ben as Hop Sing turned to go back to the kitchen.

"I´ll be back. Only bling dinner." He bustled about.

Adam measured his father with a look of expectancy.

Ben put his cup back on the table and said: "I met Griff in the Nevada State prison."

Adam raised a brow, but let his father continue.

"I was there as an inspector. He saved mine and Candy´s life during a riot. He is working on the ranch, but he isn´t free now."

"You took a convict on our ranch?" Adam asked cautiously.

Ben bristled a little, "If you want to put it that way. But Griff is a good boy. He had a lot of bad luck and he deserves a chance. When we notified the sheriff and he really went of…"

"He is violating his probation." Ended Adam.

Ben could see how his son started to simmer. Adam had always been a man with principles. He lived in accordance to a codex and had always been too smart for the ranch. This had been the reason why he send him off to study. He had become an engineer, a very good one as far as he could tell it. It happened often that Mine owners, Railway workers and government agents asked for his opinion.

"And nobody thought it would be necessary to tell me, that we run an open prison?" there it was. The betrayal of not being initiated weighed far heavier than Griff´s past.

"Griff is a worker on this ranch. Like everyone else. It was his decision whom he chose to take into confidence." Ben answered calmly.

"What would have happened if I had send him on a cattle trail?" Adam answered, equally calm, "A working ranch only works if you know your hands."

"I know him."

"Well, fine, so you gave him all this money. Off the books?" Adam snapped.

"Money?"

"I worked on the books day before yesterday and I stumbled over some funny figures. Griff was lend money a couple of times, even got an advance on his next pay. This morning I talked to Dusty. He owes everyone on the ranch. Pa, He's taken the money and made a run for it."

"Mista Adam wrong." Hop Sing smashed two dishes with fantastic looking ham sandwiches on the table with a lot more force than was recommended for the china. He had come to the room quietly to not disturb the conversation, but couldn´t contain himself,

"He is good boy. Sometimes sad. Scared. But not evil. Nevel evil."

Surprised by the sudden outburst of the gentle cook Adam raised his hands like he would await a hit, "Hop Sing, I…"

"No, not Hop Sing. Boy is alone. Out there. He luns away, yes? Takes money and luns. And folget holes." The eyes of the small man glistened as he spoke.

"Mista Adam wlong. For the filst time wlong."

Adam looked at the cook thoughtfully. He knew Hop Sing for years. He had practically grew up with him. He had got to know him as a kind man, naturally he could yell for hours. Preferably in his mother tongue. But he never, not even once had witnessed Hop Sing screaming at one of the family members.

And now this very man stood in front of him glaring. In his look was more than simple anger, much worse, there was disappointment.

"Mista Adam so smalt. Why not undelstand this?" he asked nearly pleadingly.

Adam tried to remember the impressions he had gotten from Griff King. In the corral he was a devil. If more than two hands stood together he grew taciturn. Always trying to proof something. Perhaps himself.

Adam sighed just like his father had done before, "I´m sorry."

Immediately Hop Sings complete bearing changed. A smile unfolded on his face and he started arranging the plates.

"Eat. Sleep. Tomollow sealch." He nodded towards Adam who reluctantly grasped one of the sandwiches.

Pensively chewing he watched his father and the cook as they engaged in an animated discussion about the search. Both were man who knew what they did. Nobody could take them for a ride. They weren´t dumb or naive, and yet they believed firmly in the innocence of a renegade. This horse couldn´t be a clue. Griff could have used another horse. Perhaps he used the railway. It was faster by train and his horse would have stood out everywhere. Thunder wasn´t a horse one would flee with. Everyone who saw it would recognize it.

If he had been prudent he could have crossed the bridge before it collapsed… this would give him at least two days advantage before they would be able to follow him.

Adam had seen in Griff a clever man, who could adapt to new situations within seconds and lived to a system of values which were completely different to everything he had ever seen. He really wished his Father and Hop Sing would be right. He wished all the trust would be justified. Nonetheless he went to bed with the feeling that tomorrow they wouldn´t find Griff nor would they find traces.

He was just drifting into sleep when he had the sensation that something had just shot past his window. In a matter of seconds he was wide-awake and stood, the pistol at gunpoint at the open window. He tried to hear something over the loud thumping of his heart.

Nothing creaked. His room was on the first floor, but directly in front of his room was the garret roof. It was easy to climb the pine next to the porch and brachiate over to the roof. But every intruder had to run over the wooden shingles and that always meant sound.

He stood unmoving in the darkness for about ten minutes. He listened to the night sounds of the ranch, horses, the summer herd near the main house, the rustling of the trees behind the stables.

He closed the window, put the pistol on the bedside table and climbed back into bed. Something tingled beneath his skin, showed him more clearly than a scream would have, that something wasn´t right here. Someone was sneaking around on the ranch.

Immediately his thoughts wandered to the dark figure he had spotted at the stables two days ago. Hoss had dismissed it as a shadow. In a storm everything moved and suddenly perfectly harmless trees threw shadows of monstrous things.

But he hadn´t seen a shadow. That was something he was sure of.

He pulled the covers higher. His gaze gravitated irresistibly towards the window. He couldn´t tear his eyes from the ashen silhouettes. He stared into the night until the first orange creeping over the hills reminded him, that he actually couldn´t afford a sleepless night.


	6. Chapter 6

They extended the search until the horses stumbled with exhaustion and the terrains became inaccessible. They found some scattered brute off the north herd. They found a dangerous landslide on the road to Virginia City, which they blocked, even if nobody could cross the bridge now. They found hoarse screamed voices, cold and frustration.

Adam was proven right.

They did not find Griff.

He said nothing, as they returned to the ranch in the night. He said nothing about the turmoil as the last of the searchers returned – their hands as empty as his. He said nothing as the others had to keep Dusty and Goliath from riding out again. He said nothing during dinner, even as Hop Sing broke the meat platter because his hands shook too much to hold it. He said nothing as his father drank more than he had ever before. He said nothing.

Because he knew they waited for his "I told you so". But this wasn´t about a wrongly drilled shaft or a crooked barn.

They all had set hope in a human. They had believed in something good. They had ignored the loud voices and defended what wasn´t able to defend itself. They had meant well.

And had been betrayed.

He had prophesied it yesterday.

But now, seeing their ashen faces. Tired unbelieving eyes, Adam wished, he never even started to talk.

~0~

The stiff gentleman retreated just after the meal. To be honest it was either too late, or too early to sleep now. Hop Sing followed them an hour later, as the black of the night slowly turned to a cold morning grey.

Only Ben remained unmoved. His eyes stoically set on the flames as if he was searching for something within them.

Adam sat himself down in the armchair next to the fireplace. He was exhausted. Every fiber of his body begging for rest. But the pain in his flesh was nothing compared to the expression on his father's face. It was blank.

They sat there for nearly two hours. Adam blinking again and again trying to make his burning eyes focus. Then his father said "But we had to try."

"Come again?" Adam answered and leaned forward in his chair.

His father turned his head, looked at him like he saw him for the first time:" You were right."

"I..." began Adam, but his father raised a hand and silenced him. He got laboriously to his feet.

"Not your fault." He passed Adams armchair and patted his shoulder:" But we had to try."

"Perhaps tomorrow we…" Adam knew for himself that this was senseless. They had combed the area they were able to reach. If Griff was out there, alive, he probably was halfway to Mexico by now.

"Perhaps the four found something." He finished instead.

Ben nodded "Perhaps." He went to the stairs but turned before he reached them

"Tomorrow, today," he corrected himself with a look at the window "We start repairing that bridge."

~0~

Strack tapped nervously with his foot against the table leg. The nerve-racking and monotone pounding accompanied the brooding, that kept him from sleep.

"Would you please stop that?" came Schmieds voice from the bed, where he lay stretched out.

Strack looked up and changed his posture.

"We will have to change the contract." He said finally.

"Change it?" Schmieds voice sounded more alert this time.

"Yes, change it. The sons are gone. We can´t kill who isn´t here."

"But we should have started with the youngest..." Schmied yawned.

"We should have. But he is gone. With the witness, who is hopefully dead." Strack brushed through his neatly combed hair. Thanks to the pomade it stood up vertically to his head.

"Who would have thought, they would move heaven and earth to try and rescue a street cur. I thought we would either find him, alive and well, or we would not find him, in which case he'd simply perish. But he sends his own sons out after him…" Strack frowned:" We've got to start. First the oldest son. Time is running out. At this rate we will end up having to buy that damn mine."

He got up.

He took the assignment too fast. He knew that now. But their last sphere of activity had become a little too hot and suddenly everything had to be done very quickly.

He had taken over the order without looking at the family. He hadn´t had the time to consider the local conditions. This had been very unprofessional.

If only this weather hadn't been this way.

It surely didn´t help.

"What shell we do with the other sons?" Schmied asked.

Strack shook his head:" If the youth has survived, we need to be gone before they come back."

Strack frowned deeply. He had needed the youth to be dead. He really had.

This was the trouble with magnificent plans. If things don't go exactly according to plan then one has a problem.

"What shell we do with the oldest?" asked Schmied.

Strack sighed and chewed on his thumbnail. Suddenly he asked:" Do you still have enough arsenic for both of them?"

Schmidt puffed his cheeks and shook his head:" But enough for the son I guess."

"Rotten meat." Strack said finally:" For the son just enough to make it look like we all had it."

"I have enough for that." Yawned Schmied and laid himself down again, after a while he murmured:" And the father?"

Strack droned something stroppy. He stood up and walked over to the window. He looked out at the coming dawn for some time, suddenly he tensed:" There is someone in the yard."

"Why shouldn´t there be someone?"

"He is sneaking around the barn. Masked."

"You see ghosts." The answer was muffled by the pillows.

"At six o´clock in the morning?"

"Ghosts who stopped kidding and got a job."

"I think he saw me."

"Poor guy."

"He stopped and looked directly at me."

"Brave guy."

"He is disappearing into the barn."

"Through the wall?"

"No, you idiot."

"The last ghost just fell in some nettles."

"He comes out again."

"Perhaps there are a lot of nettles around here.

"I think he is searching for something."

"Inward peace."

"I`m serious about it."

"He is certainly too."

"Now it´s gone."

"Good for it." Murmured Schmied, his last word flowed seamlessly into a snore.

Strack kept staring at the yard for some time, but the dark figure remained vanished.

~0~

Adam woke up feeling like cotton filed his head. A glance at his watch told him that he had barely slept for two hours. But his always ticking head wouldn´t let him go back to sleep.

The house was still quiet so he dressed himself and made his way to the kitchen.

He had to think about this new bridge, but first he would need some coffee. Preferably as black as his soul.

To his surprise Hop Sing already sat at the kitchen table. He was slumped forward and had his head buried in his hands. He jumped as Adam walked in.

"Sorry, I thought nobody would be up." Adam apologised.

Hop Sing rose from his place and a smile appeared on his tired face.

"Not sleeping. Always thinks about…" he didn´t finish the sentence, instead he pulled out two of the blue patterned coffee cups from the shelf. He slid them on to saucers and put them both on the table.

"No bleakfast. Just coffee." It nearly sounded excusing.

"Coffee is fantastic." Said Adam. He sat himself in front of the one cup and watched Hop Sing laying a wooden coaster on the tablecloth. The huge, iron coffeepot, that normally was just used to actually cook the coffee made the coaster hiss. The thick rag he used to touch the pot remained on the handle, so Adam could fill the cups while Hop Sing brought the sugar bowl and two spoons. The first swallow they drank silently.

Than Hop Sing said:" Mista Gliff always remine me of Mista Adam."

Adam looked up from his cup.

The cook caught his glimpse and smiled:

"Too smart faw own good. Always thlee steps before evelybody. That's why always ploblems."

Adam snorted. He remembered the dozens of talks he had with Hop Sing in this very kitchen. Always because he couldn´t figure out what he did wrong in a specific case.

Unlike Joe or Hoss Adam couldn´t react instinctively on humans. He tried to find a logic in their behavior, only to discover that there seemed to be no real rules in interpersonal behavior.

But equally how often he came to the narrow kitchen, Hop Sing always listened to the problem and explained patiently why somebody reacted the way he did.

"He is just as stubboln." Hop Sing stirred a spoon of sugar in his cup.

" Never ask fol help. Always alone. Not necessaly."

"You want to tell my I´m mule headed?" Adam asked over the rim of his cup.

"Don´t have to." Answered Hop Sing:" Mista Adam knows vely well."

Now it was Adams turn to smile:" So you don´t believe that he ran away?"

Hop Sing put his cup down:" If Mista Gliff is fugitive, Mista Adam is bank robber."

~0~

Adam had skipped breakfast and rode out to the river to have a look at the ruins of the bridge. With him the main part of the hands had swarmed out. They kept on tirelessly searching. They wouldn´t find anything. Adam was sure of it.

Even if Hops Sing and his father desperately wanted to see the good in the youth, nearly everything spoke against him. He couldn´t understand why his father had taken this convict in so easily. Not only was it dangerous for everybody involved. Now, after he had made a run for it, his father would be held responsible. And his brothers would probably stumble into problems while out searching for Griff.

He sighed to himself as his horse stumbled onwards.

The rest of the morning was spent pouring over calculations for the new bridge. He had wanted to renew it for some time now and debated with himself if it wasn´t better to build two bridges while they were on it.

The second one a little higher perhaps. He could build it where the river wasn´t as wide. The streambed was deeper there and the likelihood of the bridge being washed away was less of a risk.

It would be harder to reach but in times like this it would be useful.

It was time he rode back to the ranch, drew a plan and built this bridge so he could deal with the cranky Germans and their mine.

The lunch table was already set as he reached the house. He couldn´t help himself, but the two Gents were… weird. Today they even seemed more strange than usual. Nearly jittery. This Mr. Strack insisted on serving the steaks, so Hop Sing "wouldn´t have to run so much". Nonsense.

Adam observed the meat and tried to muster the appetite to eat it. Hop Sing would be insulted if he didn't. He had to at least eat some of it. Make an effort.

Mr. Strack downright stared at him while he chewed his first bite. Adam smiled and nodded, hoping that this would be enough to distract him. It didn´t work.

Morose he shifted the meat into his other cheek. It tasted a little sweetish. Not rotten, but strange. Did Hop Sing experiment with new flavors?

For a while they ate muted. He had the next forkful of food ready as a knock on the door interrupted them. Mr. Strack even slipped a low curse.

The knock wasn´t loud. It nearly sounded hesitant, as if the one on the other side of the door didn't want it to be opened.

Adam rose. While he went to the door he realized, that he too didn´t want this door to be opened. He poised, a hand on the door handle.

Then he made an effort.

Lucas waited on the front step. He was dirty, stubble framed his chin and cheeks and somehow he held himself crookedly. Behind him stood Candy, as if he had no business here what so ever. The expression on his face wasn´t interpretable. Frowning slightly, as if he had thought about something that wasn´t important, but somehow annoying.

Adam stepped aside to let them in but Lucas looked in the room and stated:" We would ruin the carpets."

Ben appeared behind Adam:" Any news?"

Lukas shot a look over his shoulder. Candy remained unmoving. Enraptured.

"We… we found him." Lucas said finally, again his eyes wandered to Candy, somewhat quieter he added:" He is dead."

Candy flinched, but remained silent.

Ben stood in stupor.

"Hoss and Joe went to the town, with …. the remains." Lukas said.

"The stream must have carried him away. What we found was…" his hands stayed levied, as if he wanted to show something, but then they sunk again, just like his voice.

"They brought him over to Al."

Allan McPierson was the gravedigger in Virginia City. He was a scot, the most vivacious person one ever saw and blessed with the gift of giving mourners exactly what they need.

Ben needed a while until he caught himself:

"Come in."

"But Mr. Cartwright-"

"Forget about the carpets, for god´s sake!" Ben flared.

Adam could count the occasions he had heard his father swear on one hand.

Lucas stepped inside now clearly favoring his left side, but Candy remained where he was. His face was averted to the door, his shoulders trembling slightly.

"Candy?" Ben´s voice was soft, still the foreman took a step back.

As he looked up his eyes where bloodshot:

"I´ll go and look after the horses."

He stopped at the end of the porch. Evaluating. Then he made a decision and turned:" Adam, can you spare a minute?"

"Surly." Came the surprised answer. The sought-after person stepped out in the rain.

The two crossed the yard.

Candy walked directly to the stables.

"I just wanted to say." Adam started. He hadn´t been sure how to end this sentence, so he was glad that Candy interrupted him.

"Later. First we have find a way to keep the two Germans occupied until the sheriff arrives."

"The sheriff?"

"Yes, somebody has to hear the confession?"

"Confession?"

"Naturally."

"Candy, what are you talking about?"

He's gone mental, shot to Adams head.

"We've got a plan." Candy´s grin reminded Adam of wolf fangs.

Adam watched him for a minute and became quite sure, that he should never have opened that door. The longer he listened to the ramblings of their foreman, the surer he was.

Whatever had happened to Griff had been enough to drive Candy insane.


	7. Chapter 7

One and a half day ago:

Candy and Lucas rode through the night. It was too cold and too wet to camp anywhere, besides that, Candy wouldn´t have been able to sit still anyway. Not even if his life depended on it.

So they followed the riverbank upwards until they spotted the trees. They were stacked. Nearly like a dam, just haphazard, like toy blocks.

At their top, wedged between the narrow shores, two massive trunks were embedded. Parallel to each other they spanned the nearly 26 foot deep river canyon like a bridge.

"You see that?" he yelled down at Lucas, who had descended into a dip. Lucas squinted up into a quickly brightening sky.

"Well, I´ll be damned." he growled and climbed out of the ditch: "Can something like that happen because of a flood?"

"No idea." Candy looked at the bridge just as warily as Lucas had: " With the water yesterday… I´d say, everything can happen. Doesn´t appear planned to me." he pushed his hat forward and scratched his head: "Do you think it´s stable?"

"I fear we are about to find out." Lucas grimaced, than he added:" Tell me you too see a carnival wagon?"

Really a blue and yellow painted wagon made its way to the trunk dam. On its roof a large spring was installed and on top of the spring a huge model of a tooth. With every jolt of the wagon this curiosity bounced back and forth.

Lucas head wobbled in unison with the wagon as he tried to keep an eye on the tooth.

"The trunks won´t hold that." Candy let out.

He spurred his horse and started to shout simultaneously. Whoever steered this wagon had to be warned, preferably before the trunks beneath him collapsed.

Half way there Candy knew that he would be too late. The front wheels already rumbled over the splintering bark, before he even came into earshot.

His horse shied back before the trunks, so he dismounted and run to the edge of the river bank.

"It will collapse! Get away from there!" he bellowed in the direction of the wagon. He repeated himself while the vehicle came nearer and suddenly he was able to see the driver.

It was a woman. But one could only see that because of the wild mane, that now waved in the storm.

She wasn´t young and her shape appeared rough, like it was sculptured by a clumsy artist. Candy estimated that she was at least a head smaller than him, but a lot more compact.

She wore dirty, dark trousers, a plaid shirt and a scuffed cape, which was pinned up at one shoulder, so her hands would be left free.

Between her lips stuck a very thin cigar and she watched Candy out of wise, dark eyes:" What do you want, honey?" she answered him, her voice was raucous, but not tunelessly.

The wagon kept rumbling towards Candy. He stood torpidly while he listened to the caterwauling and screeching of the trunks.

This didn´t seem to disturb the woman at all or her rickety excuses for horses, which stoically kept trotting. They reached the other bank side without anybody dying a horrible death.

She went past Candy without even slowing down. He just stared after her.

"Sorry… Miss?" came from Lucas. He had finally made it out of the ditch and to Candy´s side.

The woman just nodded in his direction and kept on going.

"Would you please stop?" called Lucas behind her.

She didn't show any reaction.

"Hey!" Lucas started riding alongside the wagon:" What are you doing here?"

"Riding a carriage." She kept puffing on her cigar without taking her hands from the reins, but didn´t show any other movement.

"You are on private property." Lukas roared now, he had overtaken the wagon and wasn´t far away from gripping the bridles of the draught horses:" Would you kindly stop!"

Immediately something flashed in the hands of the woman and Candy watched with horror how she pulled out a sawn off scattergun from under the coach box.

"You boys don´t seem to me like highwaymen. But I suppose there are neat highwaymen… So I won´t shoot you, and you won´t shoot me. You´ll keep on riding and I´ll keep on riding. And we all grow grey happy and without unnecessary holes." Her voice was still light, as if she was chatting about the weather. Only her eyes had gone hard and now looked like the iris had crystallized.

Lucas hands shot up in a kind of reflexive defense:" You got us all wrong. You won´t get any further. There is no street, it´s up the river. Around four miles."

"Who said I`m searching for a street?"

"You won´t be able to go ahead with a wagon."

"Just like I wasn´t able to go over that there bridge?"

"The washed up trunks." Candy corrected.

She let her eyes linger on the strange construction and her smile widened: " I suppose you boys want to go playing."

With her scattergun she pointed at the horizon.

Candy had an answer already lying on his tongue but swallowed it. He hadn´t the time for this nonsense. Instead he pulled himself back into the saddle.

"Over there is marshland. Don´t cross it, we won´t pull you out." He said.

She nodded half-heartedly.

"And you really are trespassing. So don´t stay here."

"I won´t. Just crossing. On my way to find friends."

"Everybody needs friends." said Candy.

He was rewarded with a smirk.

"Hope these friend's aren´t waiting for you on Ponderosa land."

"Oh, don´t worry." She took the cigar out of her mouth and blew against the tip until it was red hot:" I know how to search."

"We are searching for a friend too."

"Is that so?"

"Yep. About six foot. Black hair. Young."

She listened attentive:" What would somebody like that be doing here all by himself?"

"If we only knew."

"He had a horse?"

"Don´t know."

"What´s his name?"

"Have you seen him, or not?" Candy was very close to losing his temper.

"No I haven´t." she turned to Lucas:" You let me go on now?"

Lucas darted an asking glance at Candy, who nodded.

Unwilling, Lucas let go of the bridles. Together the two hands watched the wagon humble along.

"Can we really let her go? Like this? She´s a lunatic with a gun!" Lucas asked doubting.

"She wants to get stuck in the mud, I won´t stop her. Would be my pleasure to let her rot." Candy muttered and turned his horse.

Before it spun around completely a loud crack tolled over the meadow, followed by a curse.

"CANDY!" yelled Lukas and stormed off after the wagon. As Candy followed his gaze his blood froze in his veins.

The back axis of the wagon had literally snapped in two making it drop dangerously. The suddenly shifting loads had broken the backdoors. Out of the splintered wood hung slightly tilted a human head. A black mop of hair over an ashen face with closed eyes.

With an unarticulated yell Candy let his horse leap out towards Griff´s lifeless face.

The animal shied backwards as bullets hit the ground spraying dirt up high directly in front of him.

"You leave him alone." The woman roared.

How the hell did she get up on that wagon?

She stood next to her ridiculous tooth, the colt drawn and glared down at him.

~0~

Alone. He left him alone. Now he lay there. His eyes closed.

Dead. He had left him alone to die? How could he leave him?

Candy felt his thoughts spinning. He heard the shouting of Lucas and this woman, but he understood nothing.

He only saw Griff´s motionless face. He couldn´t look away and he knew that this would be an image that would haunt him for years to come.

He had been too late. After promising not to disappoint the youth. Why had he climbed on to the roof, or went on this trip.

Only as he heaved Griff´s upper body back into the wagon did he realise that he had dismounted. Around him everything went quiet.

A suppressed noise, like a wounded animal. Candy couldn´t comprehend that he was the one making it.

In the chaos of shattered and fallen things, on the floor of the crooked wagon Griff looked like a puppet twisted in a strange way. A thrown away toy. He wasn't wearing a shirt, his upper body, arms and shoulders wrapped in bandages. The right leg of his trousers sliced to the belt, beneath the dark denim the white of more dressings showed.

His fault.

He hadn´t paid enough attention.

He hadn´t listened enough.

He had taken off.

He would bring him home.

His fault.

Again this noise. More than grief. More than rage. Desperation perhaps.

Then Griff opened his eyes. Just like that.

Griff inspected Candy, than his bruised and torn face opened to a smile.

Candy's legs gave way beneath him. Just like that.

~0~

"Did you hear that?" asked Hoss.

He and Joe had spent the whole night trying to find a ford through the river. Perhaps a point where the water would be a little shallower. Anywhere they could pass.

First they rode up the river. The river was narrower there, but the drift became lethal. The mass of water cramped into the tight river bend shot around rocks and carried them along. Quickly they noticed that there was not only no way to cross the river, but that the ground was hazardously unstable. They decided to turn and try their luck down the river, where they and their horses' would be in no danger of collapsing into seemly massive subsoil.

"What?" Joe asked bad- tempered. It got on his nerves that they wasted nearly a whole night without making any progress.

"It was a shot." Hoss answered.

"Didn't hear anything." Said Joe. He looked at a furrow in the bend and tried to decide if it was promising enough to risk wet clothes and ride into the river.

"It was a shot." insisted Hoss.

Joe was about to explain to his brother, that if he became any more nuts Joe would have peanut butter for breakfast when a hollow bang echoed through the valley.

"This was a shot." Joe nodded.

"Gee, ya think?" Hoss already had his horse moving and Joe hurried to keep up. The ford and the wet clothes forgotten as a third shot lashed through the dawn.

~0~

Griff laid in the arms of a bear. He felt it's enormous jaw adapt nearly lovingly to his head. It's paws encircled him and kept him warm while rain drummed on the roof of the wagon. He listened to the pattering drops, his eyes too heavy to open.

He couldn´t remember how he ended up here.

He shouldn´t be in a wagon, he was certain.

Horses. They were breaking horses.

He fell off the horse.

The fog in his brain stubbornly stayed and that annoyed him.

There was something important. Just outside of his reach.

The wagon rumbled on.

Something was wrong with his body.

He couldn´t put his finger on it.

His foot, his leg, his shoulders and back throbbed.

But it wasn't a real pain.

Something kept him beneath the pain. Made him float.

It was… pleasant.

The rumbling grew stronger.

He snuggled deeper into the embrace of the bear.

Filled his ears with the fluffy fur so he wouldn't have to hear the shouts outside.

He was tired.

But something kept plucking him out of his slumber.

It was urgent.

Every time he nearly went under, it came back and pulled him to consciousness.

The rain was nice.

He had always liked rain.

He had watched the rain. He remembered that. Had watched it from a terrace.

Where did he get a terrace from?

The bear didn´t knew.

The rumbling died down.

The soft cradling of the wagon too.

They stood.

Voices grew louder.

Even through the fur in his ears.

They disturbed him.

He had to think.

He disturbed himself from thinking.

Typical.

Then there was a Bang and his world started to spin.

The bear disappeared, for in came the pain.

It came wild and roaring, storming through his body as he was thrown around. His head hit something, drops on his face. His body in a grotesque twist.

It hurt. But he couldn´t move. He simply lacked the strength to do so.

He wanted to cry out but his brain couldn´t find his mouth.

Everything blurred, got loud and dazzling.

Furious.

Then, suddenly everything was quiet again.

Something touched him.

Picked him up gentle. Laid him back down. Turned his limps till they were right again.

Suddenly he heard it.

Nearly a yelp.

Something was with him.

Something that was hurt far worse than he was.

He knew the sound. Knew the voice that made it.

He started fighting against the numbness.

It was hard.

That sound again.

He reached the surface.

Opening his eyes took nearly everything he had left in him.

For a couple of seconds everything stayed vague, then the reality slowly came into focus.

It was a man.

He stopped to mourn.

Good.

Candy.

Candy was good.

Griff's smile was encouraging.

Candy stared back.

Suddenly he vanished from Griff´s field of vision and Griff started to panic.

~0~

Candy let himself sit down on the wagon floor.

It took time till the news reached his head and it took time till he realized Griff was trying to get up.

He placed a hand on his shoulder and he stilled immediately.

Candy watched Griff lay his head back on the dusty planks of the wagon and swallowing convulsively, after some seconds he asked: "Candy?"

His voice startled Candy. It was raw, grated, it sounded like it hurt to use it.

"I´m here."

Griff closed his eyes and this dopey smile spread over his face.

Idiot. Candy breathed in tremulously.

Suddenly Griff gipped his arm, his eyes flew open:" The bear."

"Bear?"

Again the youth tried to sit up, groaning when his already mistreated body didn´t cooperate.

"There is no bear. Hey, Griff." Candy had grasped his shoulders, which made Griff yelp. Immediately Candy let go of him and cradled the youth head. Let it rest on his palm and slowly turned it until he was able to look in Griff´s eyes: "No bear."

Griff´s eyes darted about the wagon until they met with Candy´s.

"No bear?" he made a grimace while talking which confirmed Candy´s suspicion, that it really hurt the youth to speak.

Carefully Candy stroked some stray hairs from Griff's unmanageable mob out of his face:" No bear. I promise."

"Stay?" asked Griff. He leaned into the touch, a thing Candy counted to the boy´s state. Normally his hands would have been shoved away with the assurance that he was fine.

"I´ll stay." He felt Griff´s head nodding in his hand: "I´ll stay." He repeated, more for his than for Griff´s sake.

"M´sorry." The woman muttered. Her scattergun was now held loosely in one hand and Lucas stood beside her: "Found him pretty crushed. Kept stuttering about men who were after him. Then you showed up… I thought, well…"

Her dark eyes inspected Griff´s face, resting in Candy´s hands.

"Well, nothing happened." She said finally.

Candy remained silent. But Lucas growled:

"Easy to say when you don't got buckshot lodged in your a**."

"I already said: it was an accident." The Valkyrie had the decency to look compunctious, she glanced at the wagon and added: "The axis is busted. I will have to empty it one way or another. What do you say: We pull out the front tent. I'll treat you to a coffee and have a look at your backside."

"The devil you will." Lucas answered.

"I´m trained as a doc. Learned everything they could teach." The shabraque said, proudly she pointed at the, still nerve-racking wiggly, tooth.

Candy hesitatingly removed his eyes from Griff´s face, for a couple of seconds he followed the discussion between the hag and Lucas, then he asked:" Who are you?"

The hag beamed and said, with her hands on her hips: "Liz, nice to meet you."

"What are you doing here?"

Her smile remained while she said: " At the moment, well, at the moment I´m a bounty hunter."


	8. Chapter 8

Liz's wagon was a lucky bag. From the outside it looked old and battered, nearly shabby. But the moment she started pitching her camp, this impression changed.

She pulled a four by six meter long tarpaulin out of the wood inlays at the transverse side of the vehicle, for which she, of course, had pillars.

Folding chairs, a folding table, an iron tripod for the fire and some astonishingly big camp beds. All these things were carefully handed over Griff´s lying form to Lucas, who arranged them carefully.

Candy had wanted to help, but every time he pulled his hand out from under Griff´s head, the boy started to grow restless again. He even tried to get up once, fell back and only two centimeters saved his head from a painful encounter with Liz's travel chest.

So Candy sat, with Griff leaning on him, propped up against the wooden wagon wall. The youth kept mumbling but nothing made sense, or was even comprehensible.

As Liz hopped down from the wagon for the twelfth time Candy´s gaze followed her. She stopped, a box jammed under her arm and said: "Don´t worry. He´ll wake up eventually. Had to set his ankle." She pointed to the thick bandage. Two wooden splints looked out of it left and right from Griff´s foot.

"He was pretty dented. Kept trying to knock me out or crawl away. So I gave him something." She looked at him contemplating, made a step forward and lifted one of his eyelids. She closed the eye again, apparently satisfied by what she saw.

"You really are a doctor?" Candy asked skeptical.

"At least I´m the nearest thing to it you can find in a thirty miles radius." She noticed his doubting expression and sobered up: "Let´s get this boy into a bed."

She held Griff while Candy slid out of the wagon to take over again. One arm under his knees, one around his upper body he lifted him. Griff growled, opened his eyes, but closed them as soon as he saw Candy.

"Griff?" Candy froze in the movement.

"Ok," Murmured Griff: "Never mind."

"What should I never mind?" asked Candy.

"Hurts." Griff´s forehead rested on Candy´s shirt collar.

"Hurts?" repeated the foremen.

Griff nodded: "Never mind. Nobody must know."

"Nobody is supposed to know you´re hurt?"

Griff nodded again and Candy frowned,

"Why is nobody supposed to know?"

The first words were incomprehensible then followed: "… wouldn´t let me work."

"Did you work with pain before?" asked Candy quietly.

Griff shrugged but winced as his back caught fire.

"Why would you do that?" Candy felt sick while he comprehended, what he had just heard.

How often had he seen Griff fall off a horse and get up immediately? He even saw him getting overrun by a bull. Every time insisting on being all right. Sometimes he hobbled for two or three steps, but found back into his normal rut really fast.

Griff buried his face deeper in Candy´s shirt and he could hear his slurred words muffled through the fabric:" Be useful, It´s all right."

"Oh god." This came from Lucas. He had limped after Candy to help, but now stood there thunderstruck.

Dark anger rose within Candy. Anger with a fiend of father, on the years a young boy spent crammed in with murderers, on a system that drummed the idea into Griff that he was only tolerable if he was useful, on a system that thought him to never show weakness, never expect sympathy.

Candy was also angry with himself for not seeing this earlier.

"You´ll hurt him." Lucas voice pulled him back out of his roaring thoughts.

He followed Lucas line of vision and saw that he had gripped Griff´s arm so tight his knuckles whitened.

He quickly loosened his grip.

"Over here." Liz dark voice came from the wagon side of the fire. She had already pulled the covers back on one of the cot and Candy carefully laid Griff down on the thick mattress.

Nevertheless Griff gasped as his back made contact with the linen.

"Turn him, to his side." Liz commanded, while she rummaged through a box. When she came back to them she carried several crucibles.

She laid them in the grass, within easy reach. She then began removing the bandages around Griff´s upper body:" So now, let´s have a..."

Candy´s stony face made her stop.

"Hey." She let loose of the bandages to grip Candy´s shoulder.

"That's the way he looked after the accident. There was nothing you could have done about that. If you had been there or not."

Lucas growled behind them.

Candy only shook his head.

"Take of these pants and lay down on the other bed." Liz had gotten up to chase Lucas around the fire, while Candy stayed crouched before Griff.

The anger was back. Stronger than before. Stronger than it ever had been.

Griff´s eyes opened again, fixed on Candy´s face. Saw the rage.

He blinked slowly, than asked:" Overslept?" he tried to get up.

"No." Candy tried hard to dispel his anger as he pushed the youth down with endless diligence.

Griff wasn't having any of it. Coughing and writhing he eventually mustered up the strength to ask:" Five Minutes?" his voice still sounding like a grater.

Instinctively Candy´s hand wandered back to the youth forehead:" Shhhh, no it´s all right, no need to."

Griff´s eyes popped open, he turned his head, searched for Candy´s eyes. His breathing quickened.

"Griff?" Candy kneeled before the cot.

Aghast he watched panic spreading on his youthful face.

"Griff. Hey… what is it?" shocked, he saw tears streaming from Griff´s eyes. The boy just stared at him, he didn´t even seem to recognize that he was crying.

"Griff. Please." Helpless Candy took Griff´s face between his hands, thumbing tears from his cheeks he asked again, softer this time:

"What is it?"

"I´m sorry." Was everything Griff managed to say. He closed his eyes and tried to turn away from Candy.

"What? What are you sorry for?" Candy tenderly grabbed Griff´s shoulders before he could hurt his back again.

"Too late," Murmured Griff.

"To late for what?"

"To slow. Not enough." Griff answered, now literally shaking from sorrow.

Candy couldn´t take it anymore. Carefully he sat on the side of the bed and lifted Griff enough to take him in his arms. One hand on the back of Griff´s head, so he wouldn´t have to touch the beaten shoulders, the other arm attentively slung around his torso, he started rocking him.

It took time until Griff calmed enough to ask:

"So I don´t have to?"

"What don't you have to?" Candy nearly whispered the question.

"Go."

"Where?"

"You won´t send me back?"

Candy´s heart skipped a beat, he hugged Griff harder:" No. No Griff." He felt the youth tears on his neck again and silently asked himself what this hag had given to him.

"Shhhh. It´s all right."

"I thought…" Griff started, tried to turn, but yelped when pain sliced through his shoulders.

"Don´t move. Okay? One second." He tried to lay the youth back down, but he clenched into Candy´s shirt.

"Griff, you need to..."

But Griff´s eyes laid such a horror, that Candy´s words got stuck in his throat.

"A corpse can´t think." Griff got out, nearly pleading, as if he could make Candy understand.

"There are no corpses."

"Accident." One of Griff´s hands wandered to his head, pressed against his forehead:

"A corpse can´t think." He started peeling out of the covers, fought against the arms that held him.

"Hey, no, Griff."

"We have to..."but he interrupted himself when he tried to move his broken leg, he doubled over and nearly slipped out of Candy´s grip.

"Griff, Cripes! There is no one!"

"A corpse can´t think." He murmured again.

The tears were back, this time out of the pure frustration that Candy couldn't understand him, just as well as from the pain that shot through his body.

Liz interrupted the ordeal by diligently laying a cloth over Griff´s mouth and nose.

~O~

Someone held Griff.

It was a strange sensation.

He can´t remember the last time this happened.

Yes, he did! The bear held him.

This was one of those days.

Then suddenly the arms were gone.

They left.

Perhaps they were right. To leave him.

Plenty of better places to be.

He tried to sit up.

Something funny happened with his eyes.

Everything kept being blurry, like he was looking through water.

He made it to his feet.

Everything began to tumble.

He had to be on a ship.

That would certainly explain the water in his eyes.

Another wave send him crashing down again.

It hurt more than he expected.

It took him too long to push through it.

Whatever hurt him was still there.

He was defenseless.

Think!

What had happened?

A riot.

Oh no. They would kill him.

For sure now.

He had...

The arms were back.

Not restraining. Supporting.

A dark rumble in his ears. A voice.

Candy!

Everything came back. Rushing into him.

No Jail.

Not at the moment.

He lost some time.

Suddenly he was midair.

Everything hurt.

But that was alright.

He could deal with pain.

He couldn´t deal with the hands leaving him. Always too weak.

Candy said something. Suddenly let go of him.

He opened his eyes. Rage in Candy´s face.

Oh heavens he would be late for work. Again.

It kept happening to him. He would sneak out and wait for the stars to chase away the terrors that awaited in the tightness of the bunkhouse. Sometimes the stars needed time to do so.

Then he slept too little. Got up too late. Unreliable. Untrustworthy.

He tried to get up. So tired. For so long.

They would send him back.

The prison.

He was a fool to think that he made it out.

He never was really out.

A corps can´t think.

He shot up. He had to warn them.

Even if they send him back. They had every right to do so.

He let them down. Let himself get hurt. No use to them.

Not fast enough. Never good enough. Hands stopped him.

He had to brake free. Had to warn them. His body in fire.

Didn´t matter. He wouldn´t be the first to die in here.

Maybe he deserved it.

But not them. The cold water of the river. He knew he would die.

Strange noise.

Did he just scream?

More hands.

Something smelled funny.

Darkness.

~O~

"What the heck are you doing?" Candy flared up, but only seconds' later Griff´s resistance subsided.

"He won´t be out for long," Liz commented.

"You can´t knock him out like this!" Candy spat.

"He would have hurt himself," she simply answered.

"You can´t be serious." Candy wasn´t ready to let the subject drop this easily and now it was Liz turn to hiss:

"If you insist on it, I´ll wake him up. Make him feel how I change the bandages, make him feel how I clean the wounds, let him live through the terrors of his confused mind. Because it is on you to decide how much pain he can bear."

"He wanted to tell us something," Candy answered.

"And we heard it. He didn´t even make sense to himself. Give him time. Let him rest."

Still not really convinced, Candy turned to answer but didn't say anything.

In total contrast to the cold, harshness she radiated stood the expression on her face.

It showed a deep compassion. She turned before Candy could see. What she rubbed from her face could have been tears, if it hadn´t been unthinkable that someone like Liz could cry.

Instead of commenting on it, Candy busied himself laying Griff down and pulling up the quilts. Throughout the whole time he let his hand cradle Griff´s neck. He crouched again to see the face of the youth. It was pale, nearly translucent and his eyes moved restless behind the closed lids.

"Here." He felt something being rammed into the back of his knees, made them buckle and send him into a deep chair.

Without thinking he kept running his thumb up and down Griff´s neck. It seemed to settle the boy, who started to breath deeper only interrupted by an occasional m*** when Liz came to an especially tender spot.

"He crawled to me, while I was searching for a way across the river," She said while she worked.

It was easy to spot it as a habit. Something that would distract patients or anxious relatives: "Gave me one look, and keeled over."

She knotted a bandage on Griff´s upper arm and turned to tend to his back:

"Took me forever to warm him up again. Was soaked through."

Candy heard her unscrew a new crucible and walk over to Lucas. She hummed for some time, than drew murderous looking tweezers.

Lucas started to protest but she simply pressed his head into the pillow and got to work.

"Who is he?" She asked, nodding towards Griff.

Candy had to clear his throat before he could answer: "He works with us, on the ranch."

He thought for a moment but pulled himself together and added:" I´m Candy, this is Lucas."

"Delighted." Came muffled from the depths of the cushion.

"And his name is Griff."

Liz nodded: "And what was he doing at that river?"

"No idea," Answered Candy pensively.

He watched Liz while she worked: "What are you doing here?"

She sighed and said, without any real hope in her voice:" I´m searching for two Germans. A long, slender one and one who is always as neat as a pin. With a ridiculous moustache. You two didn't randomly get to know them?"

"Sounds like Schmied and Strack." Lucas said:" Are they in the mining business? Ow! Damnit!"

A hollow "Klong" showed that Liz hands had opened out of their own will. Her gaze was fixed on Lucas and from one second to the other her expression changed drastically.

The laughter lines around her mouth disappeared, the friendly looking, dark eyes became abysmal like wells and just as sinister. Candy would have betted, he even saw the hair in her neck stand on end.

Candy grew up in a military base, he had hunted pumas, had walked through an Indian territory while they were on the warpath and had served in two wars. But at this moment Liz seemed to be the most dangerous thing he had ever seen.

"The small one, does he always wear matching suits and talks terribly awry?" she asked.

Candy nodded and she gripped the tweezers again. Nearly casually she asked: " And you don´t know where they are at the moment?"

"If I tell you, would it improve the chances of my bottom to survive?" asked Lucas morose like.

"I think they are in the main house, with the Cartwrights. Have to be," Candy added.

"And what are they doing there?" Liz proceeded, obviously focused on the task before her.

"They wanted to buy a mine." Answered Lucas: "It would suit me if they were gone already. They have something strange on them...CRAP!" he swore and tried to turn to look at Liz:" For real now, what did my bottom do to you?"

"Last one," Muttered Liz and let the last pellet fall. She went to her Box and came back with a suspicious looking jar.

"What do you want from these strange characters?" asked Candy.

"Oh nothing special. Say hi… put a bullet through their brain. That kind of thing."

Lucas head shoot around: "Don´t you think that might be a little… drastic?"

Liz opened the jar: "No more drastic than shooting my husband."

"They shot your husband?" Candy quickly asked, denying Lucas the obvious question: You had a husband?

Especially considering she was a far too close to lots of very sensitive body parts of a very good friend.

Liz shrugged her shoulders, as she rubbed something cool onto Lucas right bun:" I fear that's a custom for contract killers."

~o~

"Somewhere around here." Said Joe, he gazed over the landslide but could see nothing out of the ordinary.

"Over there is a dancing snowball." Hoss mentioned. He sat straight as a die on his horse, gloating to himself.

"It´s September. There hasn't been snow for months. Snow falls. It doesn´t dance. Could you please focus?" snapped Joe.

"It's a dancing snowball," Insisted Hoss stubbornly.

Joe followed his gaze: " This clearly isn´t a snowball." He squinted at the object:" It´s a tooth. Snowball. Nonsense."

He kept on scanning the surroundings until suddenly two synapses remembered their purpose and connected.

He stared. Then turned himself slowly to face his brother:" There is a giant dancing tooth on the hill."

"It could also be a snowball." Hoss remained grumpy.

"You don´t see anything strange in this?"

"Well, yes. I mean, its September after all."

Joe didn´t take the time to explain to his bother the subtleties of advanced imbecility, instead he let Cochise tunnel his enormous energy into reaching the dancing tooth.

~O~

"Contract killers?" yapped Candy he rose from his chair but was stopped by Griff complaining. Resigned Candy let himself fall back and proceeded to stroke through Griff´s hair. It was a little too long. He absent-minded registered to take him to the barber, as soon as he was able to ride again.

"I think they are." Liz answer sounded reluctant. She began to pat down her pockets and revealed out of their depths, which hopefully no man had to see before, a wooden object.

It wasn´t much more than two tablets, five by eight centimeters, on the long side connected together with hinges. It looked like a small book. She opened it and gave it first to Candy, than to Lucas.

It contained two pictures.

One, of a considerably more groomed Liz.

She looked at the viewer with flashing eyes and even the black and white of the picture couldn´t hide her absolute zest for life.

The other picture showed a small man. He wore spectacles with round lenses, which nickel frame disappeared behind his big ears. He had sparse hair and his head was somehow egg-shaped. His mouth was stretched into a broad grin and his eyes radiated, bright enough to forget big ears, sparse hair and an egg-head.

Candy tried to imagine the couple they must have been and smiled involuntary.

"My Albert," Said Liz.

Her voice wasn´t hoarse and she didn't start to snivel. But the way she rubbed the glass clean with her blouse, before she looked at it one last time and pocketed it again made Candy miss something he never had.

Love could be found in the strangest of places.

"He was a doctor. Had studied and everything. Taught me all he knew." She sounded a little proud as she proceeded:

"Could do nearly everything, my Albert." She climbed back into the wagon and retuned with a huge iron coffeepot.

"I´m not even sure why they killed him. I believe it was… just a coincidence. An accident." She wiped her nose with the back of her hand:

"I heard a shot, looked out of the wagon and saw these two standing over my Albert, arguing. They had a photo with them.

´He looks a little like him.´ the long one claimed, he called himself Talbert at this time."

`Looks a little like him? This guy has a crew cut, and no glasses! ´ shouted the other, Müller or something like that he was called.

´It was dark´ said the long one and I couldn´t listen anymore. They spooked the moment I stepped out the door."

She chuckled doleful:

"It was dark. Can you imagine that? Shoot my Albert because it was dark."

"Did you go to the sheriff?" asked Lucas, he spoke quietly and his voice carried more than his words.

"Oh yes, I did. When I came back with him the two were already gone." She heaved the pot in the flames.

Candy knew this type of person. Always busy with something. Always fiddling with something. The moment these persons got quite, you knew there was trouble.

"Sheriff send his Deputy, but the two were fast and clever. The Deputy was too young, his sixth week on the job. I don´t think the Sheriff took it too hard when he returned empty handed. Just travelling people."

"But this was murder." Began Candy.

"There is murder, and there is murder." Liz interrupted him: "And woefully few souls look our way, as long as we are gone by next Thursday."

She smiled at Candy who stared back, utterly lost for words.

"Sorry." She added and swirled the coffee.

A couple of seconds of silence followed before she said: "Buried my Albert there. Couldn´t take him with me, could I? Found a nice tree. So he wouldn´t be alone…" her voice faded and she focused with all her might on the boiling liquid in front of her.

Lucas arm was already stretched towards her, as she straightened up. She harrumphed a couple of times and said:" Then I followed them. Took me six months. To my good fortune they are unbelievable bunglers."

"Bunglers?" asked Candy.

"In Mahano they tried to suffocate the gravedigger in his own exhibition coffin, but forgot that this thing was bottomless. In Albanie they tried to do away with the bank director. With poisoned coins. I think they had problems with the mixture. Everyone who touched these things got terrible winds, but nobody died."

She started to share out coffee and cups as she continued the story: "In Glenmor they took the cake. In every sense of the word. They tried to shoot the Major during the start of the big horserace. He was standing there, gave a speech, about how important this race was for the city, jackedijackedijack, while all the horses stood there snorting at the start line. Suddenly a shot rings out, and off they go. These idiot's missed the major by two hands width and shot the cake. Was a real pretty one too, special for the occasion, nearly three feet high. Cream everywhere, the race start was an unmitigated shambles.

I tell you. Nearly got them that time, but then my horse tried his luck with the cake and I got stuck. Don´t ask."

Candy grinned while she handed him a cup.

"HANDS UP, NOBODY MOVE! Don´t fear, we are here to liberate you and –"Little Joe´s pithy speech suffered a little at the end as he saw the four peaceful figures sitting around the fire. He had charged with Hoss around the wagon, the colts drawn ready for anything.

Except for this tubby woman who held out a cup and asked:" You´d like some coffee with your liberty?"

It took sometime before they could convince Hoss and Joe that there really was no need to rescue anyone.

"But I heard Lucas scream." Persisted Joe and looked at said yeller.

Lucas turned beet red and snapped: " I'd like to see you with a load of buckshot in your..."

Half an hour later Joe sat, gleefully grinning, next to his brother at the fire. The fact that they found Griff alive was a reason to celebrate. Lucas hilarious misfortune was just the icing on the cake.

Not until Candy repeated Liz concerns regarding the two Germans did Joe and Hoss sober up.

"You're telling me we left Pa and Adam with them, on the Ranch, alone?" Hoss said, already rising from his chair.

"What are you intending to do once you get to the ranch? Handle it like Liz? Shoot them?" Lucas said, stalling the big man with a hand to his sleeve.

"Why not?" Joe answered heated.

"Because they haven´t killed anyone yet. To be exact they even helped us in the search for Griff."

Candy interjected:" If you shoot them like this, you are a murderer. And they hang murderers."

Grumbling Hoss dropped back into the chair which squealed alarmingly under his weight.

"If you are right and they are killers." Candy started.

"What do you mean, ´if`?" snapped Liz.

"I know you for half a day. Just because these Germans really get up my nose and you are good at telling story´s, doesn't mean any of this is true." Declared Candy.

Liz opened her mouth to answer but changed her mind.

"But if we assume you are right, and they are hit men, then they have to be here for a contract, right? What if we… just play along?" Candy asked.

"Play along?" even Joe´s ears looked unconvinced.

"Let them believe they did everything they wanted to do." Candy explained.

"I still don´t get it." Came from Hoss.

"Let´s say, they aim to kill someone, or at least try, and in the next room stood the Sheriff… watching." Said Candy and swirled his coffee cup.

"Why should they do something like that?" asked Hoss.

"If we lead them into the right situation, they will." Said Candy.

"If we lead you into a lunatic asylum…" answered Lucas.

Candy ignored him:" In any case somebody should call the sheriff and we should get back to the ranch."

"How, with this axis?" asked Liz:" Somebody got a pulley with them?"

"Nope." Joe dumped the rest of his coffee on the ground and stood up: "Got something better."

He clapped his brother on the chest: "Come on, move."

Agape Liz watched how Hoss lifted his hat while he walked past her, then gripped with both hands beneath the wagon and lifted the vehicle.

"Holy sh.."

With some fast handles Joe had localized the problem and went off to search for mending-wood, while Hoss put down the wagon carefully.

"What do you feed him with?" asked Liz perplexed.

"Normally with everything he is able to reach." Answered Lucas.

Hoss's face flushed a shade darker:" I… Ma'am."

But Liz was faster:" That's fantastic! Somebody like you would have been worth his weight in gold with us!"

Instantly Hoss face lightened up.

A movement beneath his hands drew Candy´s attention away from the spectacle.

Griff grimaced and coughed, before one of his hands came up and confusedly felt for Candy´s which still rested on the youth head.

"Candy? Is that you?" his voice still sounded rough, but more alert.

"Griff?"

"Who the hell should I be instead?" this made Candy grin.

"Where are the beasts?" asked Griff then.

"Beasts?" perhaps not that much more alert.

"Must have been at least a heard that had stumbled over me." Grumbled Griff. He tried to sit up but Candy pushed him back.

"Stop that. Already tried that. Hadn´t been a good idea."

Griff looked around puzzled:" Where are we?" he then made a face: "And what is nesting in my mouth? That's disgusting."

"Take a sip of this." Liz held a bottle in front of Griff´s nose.

"What´s sort of pond scum is this?" asked Griff and stared up at Liz.

Liz just chuckled and resolutely made Griff swallow two spoons of the brew.

"I want the nest back." Griff remarked while he tried to swallow the mixture.

"What do you remember?" asked Candy.

"What?"

"Do you remember anything?"

"Till when?"

"The last few days?"

"What day is today?" asked Griff and closed his eyes.

"No idea," Admitted Candy.

"You´re helpful," Snarled Griff and Candy was sure he very softly added:" Robbing the savings bank of Virginia City with you, a nightmare."

Candy looked from him to Liz, who still stood next to them.

She laid one hand on Griff´s forehead and Candy was surprised to see the youth lean into the touch.

"He won´t remember this," She said with a sad smile.

"He won´t?" Candy furrowed his brow as Griff blinked very slowly.

"No. But you should talk to him." She let her hand cup Griff´s cheek. It was an oddly tender gesture, which made Griff young. So much younger than the lager than live image he showed the world.

"I think he waited for you. Said your name a couple of times." She stroke Griff´s cheek gently. Griff hummed to himself and Liz smile widened. She let her hand linger for a moment longer, but then quickly moved on to whatever she had in mind with that bottle.

Griff´s eyes opened sluggishly, he grinned at Candy. Now a clearly drugged grin:" What did you ask?"

"What you remember?" repeated Candy.

Griff´s face twisted with the effort to fulfil Candy´s request.

"What about ´corpses can´t think´?" Candy coaxed.

Griff eyes snapped open and observed him with a gaze that touched concern:" I would say that's rather likely." Then something like a sudden reminding flashed:" Say, where is the bear?"

"You and your bear."

"There was a bear." Griff pointed out.

"The most beary thing we have is Hoss," Answered Candy, Hoss waved.

"Not hairy enough." Muttered Griff.

"Well…" started Joe and received a swat from his brother.

"Griff here is no bear."

"He was there. In … in a forest. Came directly at me. Really thought he would lunch me."

Liz roaring laughter made them all look up. She once again climbed in the wagon and came out, tightly wrapped in a bearskin.

It was incredibly impressive. The head still intact, the fur shimmering, the paws mighty and the claws long and curved.

"Did the bear look like this?" she asked.

"A bear." Came a sudden yelp from Lucas bed.

"There you are!" said Griff and snuggled back into the cushions, looking incredibly pleased with himself.


	9. Chapter 9

_Back to the present:_

He had ridden off with Candy. Why the hell had he ridden of with Candy?

The Forman obviously had lost his mind.

Adams stomach contracted painfully with the thoughts of what could be going on in Candy's head.

For a while Candy had tried to explain himself, but Adam's open disbelief made him shrug and just add:" I´ll show you."

Now he was riding behind Candy´s dark coat. The Rain ran into his eyes, however deep he pulled his hat forward, his vison kept getting blurry.

He didn´t like to leave his father like this, but Candy had stated Lucas had come back with him for exactly this reason. To look after his father. This was advanced moronism.

He simply should have dragged Candy into the house. A brandy and a warm fire would have done a lot more for him than this afternoon mudslinging.

His stomach growled attentively. He really should have...

His thoughts were interrupted by the fact that behind the hill he just climbed, not more than half an hour away from the main house, a carnival gave a performance.

It was a pretty small carnival though. One wagon. But there was Hoss… sitting under a tent near a fire. Was there a bear lying on a cot? Oh and yes, the usual strange looking gypsies. Well, one strange looking gypsy.

He followed Candy to the odd looking camp, dismounted and scanned the area.

The gypsy waved him over and offered him a cup of coffee. He took it, because it had been too much effort to refuse it.

He let Hoss talk him into one of these, unusual comfortable folding chairs and, let him keep on talking about the craziest story he had ever heard.

"You´ve send Joe to Virginia City to fetch the sheriff, because our guests are contract killers?" he asked, just to make sure he really heard it.

The pulling in his stomach got stronger and he was no longer sure that it was just concern for their officially mad Forman. Apparently Hop Sings new spice mix did not suit him.

Candy and Hoss nodded.

"And they are after us?"

"We believe, that they are after you." Remarked the gypsy. Liz. The gypsy. The she-devil over there. Something didn´t seem quite right with his brain today.

"They talked on the terrace." Grumbled the bear, he seemed loopy… somehow.

"They talked about what?" asked Candy.

The bear growled:" Don´t know. Can´t remember the words. Just remember…. Fear."

"Fear of them?"

"Don´t know. Fear."

"And then?"

"Then there was the river."

"Did you talk to them?" asked Candy, determinedly searching for something.

"Don´t know." The bear fell silent again.

"Doesn´t sound good to me." The gypsy added.

"So they took Griff too." Candy assumed.

"Griff?" Adam dug deeper:" The hand we've been searching for the whole time, this Griff?"

The bear interrupted them:" They spoke German." Mumbling he repeated:" But I forgot the issue."

"You never knew." Candy said tartly.

"How do you know?" growled the bear.

"They spoke German. How the hell do you understand German?"

"The bear speaks German?" asked Adam, he wanted at least to be sure on one thing.

The bear turned towards him, then a severely battered head appeared from out of the fur.

"That's Griff." Adam informed the world in general, then specified in Candy´s direction:" That´s Griff."

"I see him, too." Came it from the gypsy. Liz.

"You stay out of it!" snapped Adam:" Why is Griff alive?"

"Hey." Griff sounded rather hurt:" Sorry, to disappoint you."

He seemed… drunk. No that wasn´t the right word. Joe had looked exactly like this, when he fell down the stairs and bumped his head. He still talked with them the entire evening, went off to bed for himself and couldn´t remember a thing the next morning.

"It wasn´t meant like that. But you came back, telling everybody he was dead. I started thinking we needed to pick up your pieces over the next month and then I find he is lying here?" something inside Adam contracted painfully and he had to stop before he was able to continue: "That's just… wrong."

Candy had the decency to look contrite:" We had to. We assumed Griff heard something he shouldn´t have heard."

He seemed to remember the original subject: " That reminds me: German, seriously?"

Griff suddenly seemed very interested in the fire.

"You speak German?" Candy repeated.

"Always say I learnt it on a farm." Something hilarious must have been hidden in that statement, because Griff softly started laughing to himself.

"You always say it?" Candy probed.

"Ist genauso wahr wie mein Bär. Als ob mir hier jemand glaubt." Griff pronounced in perfect German.

"Somebody understood that? " Candy asked.

"Ja." Was everything Griff had to add.

Candy felt questions rise up in his throat, but Griff´s expression made him swallow them. Griff´s past was full of dark places and he wouldn´t make him visit one of them again.

Adam thoughtfully rubbed his abdomen:

"So the last thing you´re able to remember is our porch and then …"

"I found him." Liz intervened.

"Woke up in the river. Between some wedged trunks." Answered Griff. Pain lines were evident on his face.

Liz had repeatedly tried to give him laudanum, but despite the concussion and the fact that Griff was completely out of it, he rejected her. Just repeated that it wasn´t worth it.

She had looked at him quizzically. But Candy, Griff´s outburst still in his mind, understood the youth. Everything that really terrified Griff had always lurked between his ears.

"And now you..." Adam interrupted himself, one arm firmly pressed into his abdomen.

"What´s the matter?" asked Hoss. He had watched his brother with growing concern. He acted funny. Well Adam must have thought that they had all gone haywire, but still.

Adam just rumbled a forced:" Moment." And doubled over.

After an eternity he raised enough grip on himself to finish the sentence:" Now you want to break through their reserve?"

"That's the Plan. What´s up with you?" Hoss persisted.

"No idea. My stomach isn´t so fond of Hop Sings new spice mix I think." A new cramp made him stop again.

"Spices, huh?" asked Liz. She had come over and turned Adam gingerly, so she was able to get a good look at him.

"Yes." He answered.

"What did they taste like?"

"No idea. Spicy. On the meat I think." He cursed as he suddenly had the feeling something vivid moved inside him:" sweet." He panted finally and tried to get up.

"Sweet." Liz repeated, but had to jump aside when after two steps Adams legs gave way and he vomited into the wet grass.

Instead of turning away in disgust Liz laid a hand on his back and thoroughly examined the puddle.

She cursed: "Hold him." She commanded in Hoss's direction.

Hoss had been at his brother's side before Liz could even open her mouth. Candy in contrast stood in stupor. He watched perplexed, the woman vanishing inside the wagon with incredible speed.

"What´s going on?" he asked feeling helpless and made the mistake of also looking at the puddle: "Is that blood?"

Hoss shot him a wary glance. As Adam went down for the count, Hoss caught him just in time to prevent him from falling in his own sickness.

"I think." Liz voice came out of the wagon:

"He has been poisoned."

"Poisoned." Hoss spat out.

Adam tried to curl into himself, he then suddenly stopped all his movements and cried out. The Adam who normally would prefer losing a limb over showing his distress howled in pain.

"Candy, what…", began Griff.

"Stay down." He answered the youth without taking his eyes of the macabre spectacle.

But naturally Griff tried to get up. With pasty, colorless features he managed to get onto his elbows before he fell back. He tried again but this time Candy was faster, he pushed the youth back on the bed, held him as he started to cough, still held him as he suddenly went lax in his arms. He waited until he was able to hear Griff's breath, felt his fast but steady heartbeat, before he turned to face the brothers again.

Hoss was bend over Adam, his face showed something akin to helpless determination as he mantra-like repeated: "That's it. Just breathe through it. You´re doing good."

"I´m not giving birth!" Adam hissed while he tried to find a position where the pain

wouldn't be red-hot.

"He has to drink all of it." Liz appeared next to Candy, shaking her canteen, opened it and held it for Adam.

A stench of foul eggs permeated the air.

Adam gagged.

"I know." Liz gruffly gripped his head and forced him to take a swallow and another one: " Hold him, damn it!" another swallow.

Around the disgusting liquid in his mouth Adam sputtered: "What´s that?"

"It will help you." Liz answered:" If it´s what I think it is. The meat was sweet, you say?"

"Sweet, yes." Adams voice was near whimper, by the time Liz made him take another swallow.

He took some seconds to breath before he asked: "Why sweet?"

"I think," Liz said very slowly:" it was arsenic."

"Arsenic?" asked Candy incredulous.

"Have seen it before. Oops." She automatically caught Adams hand before he trapped in a new cramp could hold it into the fire.

"One more." She pressed the canteen back against Adams lips.

"What is that stuff?" asked Candy, his face turned as far as he was able in an attempt to avoid the smell.

"My Albert called it, Papperjack." Liz said airy like.

"Papperjack?"

"Yep, learned it from a former colleague of his."

"Nice, gnnnn..." Adams comment was suddenly cut short.

"I know." Unimpressed, Liz dipped her hand into the water bucket next to the fire and ran it over Adams forehead and neck:" The cramps will get better eventually."

"Reassuring." Adam nodded shakily.

They took nearly half an hour to infuse Adam the whole canteen and about as much time until he stopped trashing.

Now he laid on top of the last cot, eyes closed, Hoss by his side like a statue.

"Will he, I mean..."

Liz patted Candy´s back encouragingly:

"Papperjack is normally quite effective. You have to give him time though. Arsenic poisoning is awful."

Candy followed Adam's shallow breathing for a while.

"How did you know?" he finally asked.

"Sweet." Liz said.

"Oh good you´re not talking in riddles. That would make me really mad."

"Arsenic tastes sweet. Normally you can hide it in a lot of foods. Coffee, for example, or cake. But thankfully, these two idiots selected something that had to attract attention." She shrugged.

"And what was that stuff you gave him?" He winced sympathetically.

"Sulphur, and some odds and ends. Pretty complicated to make. The invention had been a huge coincidence. Bert, the work colleague of my Albert, he tended to experiment. He was experimenting with Sulphur that one day and thought the whole thing went wrong. So he left it and went to meet Albert.

His dog, Papperjack, took the opportunity to eat everything that remained on the worktable. So he ate the Sulphur, some coal and three times the lethal dose of arsenic." She made a dramatic brake, Candy would have been able to live without:

"When he came back Papperjack was on his back, yelping. Everybody thought he was a goner, but he survived the night. Three days later they brought a girl with an arsenic poisoning in the clinic they worked. Bert repeated the busted experiment, the girl survived and from then on Papperjack had to share his name."

"So he will be ok?" asked Candy who had only listened with half an ear.

Liz followed Candy´s gaze to Adam and sighed: "I believe yes."

Both watched how Hoss laid a hand on his brothers chest, like he wanted to make sure that there was still a heart pumping. He let his hand linger for a moment.

Then he rose, got out of his heavy coat and tucked it around the bundle that was his brother. There was something touching in this gesture. Perhaps because it was the quintessence of Hoss.

Candy knew him for some years now.

He got to know him as a big hearted man.

Behind his enormous body, the muscles and the unbridled power was a boy who never stopped looking out for his little brother and adoring his older brother.

For outsiders Hoss often wasn´t much more than his name. A dim-witted giant.

But if you got to know him you found out very quickly, that he was the glue who held together track after track. Without asking questions, without judging he took everybody at face value.

Never, not for one second had Candy been able to believe Hoss could hurt someone. By accident, perhaps, but never intentionally.

But when he rose, into the clammy air, away from the wretched, still form of his brother he emitted a dark fury. For a moment Candy believed he could actually see it curl around him like black smoke.

Then Hoss was near enough to quietly ask:

"They did this to him?"

Liz evaluated his appearance cautiously, but nodded:" Pretty sure yes."

Hoss kept quite while he passed them on his way to the horses.

"Where do you want to go?" Candy asked.

Hoss didn´t answer, he was climbing onto the horse when Liz said:" You're no use to him in jail. Or on the gallows."

Hoss turned his back to them. For a terrible moment Candy thought he would mount up and ride away. That would leave him with two possibilities: Watch a friend commit murder, or shoot him out of the saddle.

But then Hoss started talking, his deep bass rougher than normal:

"Will they pay for this? Pay for… killing people." He took a deep breath and added:

"Tried killing my brother. For money. Every cattle is worth more alive. But my brother, my brother has to die."

"Come, help me pack the wagon." Liz voice was tender:

"We´ll take these two with us, as soon as Joe comes with the sheriff. We gonna sort this proper. Make them pay, proper."

"Why should I wait for a judge?" asked Hoss, but Liz's answer had him turn.

"Because your brother would believe in it."


	10. Chapter 10

Clem Forster always thought of himself as good Sheriff. He was patiently, clever, fast and thorough.

Since he had taken over the office from Roy Coffee he had managed everything that came his way.

Nevertheless he was glad for this storm.

In opposite to the most inhabitants in and around Virginia City, for Clem a storm was a time out.

Equally how hard you were as a bad boy, if you had the possibility to choose you would always select the day for your bank robbery when your underpants would stay dry.

So Clem had been sitting in his office, with a nice cup of coffee and the last of the paperwork, when suddenly a very wet, very muddy Joe Cartwright came bolting through the door.

Clem had signed.

How had Roy put it: "A Cartwright never makes problems, he gets them for free."

He had spent a notable amount of time trying to calm Joe down – who told a completely incoherent story about a collapsed bridge, a new bridge (but not a real one), buyers for a mine and contract killers- but Joe was having none of it.

The youngest Cartwright son wasn´t a liar. Not in that sense. He just let himself get tangled up in strange matters and sometimes certain parts of his brain were more tangled than others.

Clem had toyed with the idea of letting Joe cool down in one of his comfy cells for some hours… a day tops, when the Cartwright said:" Look Clem, I´m not drunk. You come with me, and I´ll show it to you. If you still believe its gibberish after that … I´ll clean the jail for a month."

Clem had taken about half a second to think about it and then concentrated on the delightful view of a month without housekeeping chores:

"Just let me get my coat."

~o~

Schmied sat sulking in their room. He still hated the west. He hated Cowboys and he had a near pathological aversion to the word "Howdy"-

But something had changed. Something that never happened before.

It wasn´t that the surrounding nature suddenly looked more pleasant. It still was nature and so in principle unreasonable. Also the stillness of the ranch irked him just as much. Only a good bar fight would have made it nearly palatable.

All these little inconveniences were only suddenly less prominent because Mr. Strack had berated him.

Him!

A Pro.

If it wasn't for him the man would still be sitting in that stinking vessel he crossed the ocean with.

Of course an uninvolved observer could come to the conclusion that Strack made the plan of action. Unfortunately that was true. But it made a bad situation only much worse.

The Stracks of this world might be able to plan a killing, but what would they do if they got blood on their polished shoes?

Schmied snorted over his own joke.

Well… perhaps he was to blame too, just partly, on Strack berating him.

He should have given poisoned meat to the son and the father. There he got bogged down in details a little. And it ended with Strack serving the steaks himself.

Adam had gotten a deadly dose. So far so good. Only the poison for the father went astray somehow.

Schmied refiled his shaving brush tumbler with this awful whiskey. What had the cook called it? O yes, Bonanza Bourbon.

This yellow rat had told him he saved it for the drinker who deserved it.

First Schmied had tried to drink it out of the glasses which stood on the bedside tables. Only to learn, that this stuff ate holes in them. After some experimentation he found that his tinny shaving brush tumbler was more durable and so switched, pouring the vile stuff into that.

At least the stuff was strong. This was everything he wanted.

This room was so quite. Quite like this damn ranch.

How long would Strack need to stay on the privy?

He always did have a weak stomach.

Schmied gripped the tumbler.

At least they had done some part of the job today.

And his stomach had proven on more than one occasion that he was able to handle turpentine, if his owner didn't have enough money for rotgut.

~o~

Clem Forster always thought of himself as a sensible man. He only drank in moderation. He smoked in moderation. He didn´t fight. These were things he couldn't afford to do because he was law and order. He was the principle of right.

At this moment law was looking at a bouncing tooth and a gnome, who shouted at horses that desperately tried to pull a brightly colored carnival wagon out of a mud hole.

Order took fright when suddenly the wagon started to move and a loud scream echoed.

The principle of right noted how a figure that bore a striking resemblance to Hoss Cartwright climbed out of the mud hole, shook himself and tried to wipe the dirt from his face.

Clem was glad that law, order and right noted all of that, because the only thing Clem was able to think about in this moment, was that he would have to clean the cells himself.

~o~

Strack sat on the repugnant floor of an outhouse somewhere in Nevada. He had spent the last three hours giving back to the earth all he had eaten that day.

In all objectivity, there had been better days for him.

His stomach contracted again, but not nearly as bad as before. He spit one last time and then hauled himself up on the raw wood-wall.

He didn´t understand why people would want to live like this.

There were marvelous sanitary inventions. During his time in Sacramento he had grown accustomed to all of them, to a point where he took them for granted.

With trembling fingers he sorted his cloth.

Equally where he was, or how less his stomach might contain, it was necessary to keep a distinctive appearance.

It was bad enough as things were. This Cartwright scion just took off. Was it too much to ask for one, only one of them to die where they were intended to?

Instead they rode through world history.

At least the young street dog was dead.

And Adam Cartwright would be dead soon too. It didn´t matter where he tried to hide.

Strack opened the outhouse door.

Dusk had already started creeping in.

Strack breathed deeply to get rid of the frowst that had settled in his lungs. The cool evening air refreshed him and for the first time in hours the need to strangle Schmied lessened. Sometimes it surprised Strack how completely unencumbered with dexterity Schmied was. Of course, he had his uses and knew nearly every way to get a human flat on his back, six feet under green turf. He was even passable with poisons – Strack got to know that first hand. But there was no fines, no esprit, no flair for the noble art of killing. Schmied would thump a man over the head and leave him lying, if the job didn´t come with more detailed instructions.

Strack sighed deeply.

It lacked style. And in their business you were nothing without style, least of all a professional.

A strange noise made him look up. With growing suspicion Strack watched the Forman dragging his horse into some bushes, far away from the stables. He seemed to have tied it somewhere to the impenetrable leafage, because he stumbled out of the bushes without the horse.

"Mr. Canady?" asked Strack, silent amusement in his voice. The Forman flinched.

"Oh Mr. Strack… I..ahm… didn´t want to scare anyone."

"By rummaging around in the bushes?" asked Strack.

The Forman looked like a little boy with his hand in the cookie jar:" I have to round up two or three of the boys, without Mr. Cartwright knowing." He added quietly.

"But why?" asked Strack oddly puzzled.

Candy´s expression changed and became something so dark that it made Strack take a step back.

"Mr. Canady? Is something wrong?"

"What?" Candy looked up and the darkness drifted out of his eyes:" No, sorry, I… Adam is dead." Candy said it like he couldn´t believe it himself.

For a couple of seconds Mr. Strack stood frozen:" What did you just say?"

Candy shook his head:" He suddenly started to cramp, I tried to get him home, but…. I left him at a cave near the river, so nothing could… could reach him. I couldn´t bring him back. Not like this. Couldn´t let his father see him like this. Thought perhaps Al could help with that. He somehow manages to… make them look friendly. Even the guy who got stuck in this mineshaft…" he stopped to seemingly ask himself what he was doing there:" I´m sorry I bothered you with this."

He was half on his way when he stopped, quickly coming back to Strack he added:

"Please don´t tell his father. I can´t tell him like this. Not with his heart." He interrupted himself.

Strack listened up:" His heart?"

"Yes his heart. Doc tells him regularly. Shouldn´t be drinking coffee or alcohol, no stimulants… the usual. So if YOU were to meet him..." Murmured Candy, busy with something else.

"Oh I see, a massage like this..?"

"Yeah, it could kill him." Candy took off his hat to brush a hand through his hair:" I can´t tell him like this. Perhaps when Joe and Hoss are back."

He disconnected himself from the bright window squares of the bunkhouse und looked Strack in the eyes:" Promise me, that you won´t tell him. Please."

Strack laid a hand on his shoulder, the gesture nearly fatherly:" Don´t fear. I will be very careful." He squeezed Candy´s arm one more time and tactfully withdrew. As soon as the front door slammed into its lock he started to run.

Candy watched the assassin walk back to the house and shrugged when a voice out of the leafage asked:" You think he swallowed it?"

~o~

Clem Forster always thought of himself as a man who had seen it all before. But now he stood behind the living room curtains in the Cartwright household to witness a German industrialist confessing a murder.

Mass hysteria. That had to be it.

Clem didn´t see another solution that would explain why everybody on this ranch had gone nuts.

He really wanted to believe it. Because the only other explanation made this whole mess real.

Unfortunately the two battered bodies, which he had seen in the carnival wagon, had been all too real. He didn´t recognize Griff at first. His face swollen and discolored. Adam was deathly pale. Both were sleeping.

But it had been Joe's reaction that made Clem believe for real.

The youngest Cartwright son, normally constantly moving, stood rigidly by Adam's bed.

For a long time his eyes only followed the moving chest of his brother.

When his eyes finally traveled to his brother's face, Joe's expression was a complete blank. Clem feared what would come. He had seen it before.

Like the time a five year old girl had been overridden. Her father had waited at her bedside until she slept, for good. He came, with this exact blank face into the saloon and had asked the rider very calmly to come outside with him. He shot the rider on the open road. The storekeeper had been fast enough to prevent the father from following the rider and his daughter into eternity. To this day Clem couldn´t say if this had been for the better. He didn´t remember too much of the case, but he remember the face.

The face of a man who had been pushed too far.

~o~

Strack reached the first floor slightly disheveled and panting. Normally this would have bothered him, but right at this moment, he hadn´t the time for such vanities. Now he had the opportunity to finish this job, pack their bags and get the hell out of there.

He stormed into the room and was right in the middle of the sentence before he saw Schmied. He sat, his eyes buried in the depth of his shaving tumbler on a chair at the window.

He was swaying while sitting.

 _"Maurice?"_ Strack used Schmied´s real name rarely. He only did it, when he absolutely reached a point beyond every good intent.

 _"What is it, Eugen?"_ asked Schmied back in his mother tongue.

 _"Are you drunk?"_

 _"No!"_ Schmied seemed earnestly indignant.

He put down the shaving tumbler with a dumb "klank" and rose from the chair, still swaying:

 _"I am."_ He explained, one finger pointing at Strack:

 _"canopy-fall-smelling-plastered."_ He giggled. (Editor´s note: This is a German term, here translated literally. It´s just as rude as it sounds. In case you want to include it to your active vocabulary: Himmel-sturz-stink-besoffen. There you go. )

For a brief second Strack considered throwing him out the window.

As drunk as he was, no one would question it.

But it wasn´t professional. One just didn´t kill ones partner on a job. Unless the partner was the job.

And the damn window wasn't high enough to securely kill him anyway.

So, instead of getting rid of his pillion, Strack got Schmied´s case out from under the bed.

Gasping he hoisted the monstrosity on the bed and fiddled a little with the locks.

 _"What are you doing?"_ Schmied asked interested.

 _"I´m searching for the opium."_ Strack answered.

 _"Opium?"_

 _"Yes, Maurice, Opium. The father has a weak heart, any kind of hypnotics and he´s over the Styx."_ He stopped himself, studied the alcohol induced smile on his partners face and decided that any more explanations would only burn his lifetime.

 _"You were right."_ Schmied said nearly purring.

 _"Oh yes?"_ Strack shot him a glance.

Schmied, again dangling alarmingly from his chair, pointed to the window: _"That ghost",_ he hiccupped: _"Was here again."_

 _"Really."_ Strack focused his attention back on the suit case, he didn´t have the time for liquor-hallucinations. Swearing to himself he kept piling the case's contents out on to the bed.

Schmied watched his partner, blissfully smiling, stacking banknotes in bundles on the comforter.

 _"Still don´t know, why we took them with us."_ Schmied stated dreamily.

 _"Because."_ Strack answered without taking his eyes from his task: _"We had to go quick and I don't feel like banking thirty thousand dollar in one piece and without explanation somewhere. That's screaming for attention. I don´t intend to beg for trouble."_

Schmied muttered something under his breath.

 _"What?"_

 _"How?"_

 _"How what?"_ Strack visibly lost patience.

 _"How do you beg for trouble?"_

Strack shook his head and decided that this comment never happened.

 _"What are you searching for?"_

 _"Opium. Still."_ Strack snapped.

Schmied surprised him with the answer:

 _"In the outer pocket. Has a..."_ he interrupted himself to belch _:" a double bottom."_

And really there was. And there was a nice little bottle. Strack plugged the money back in the bag, went to the wardrobe and returned with his special suit. It was tailor-made, which was always an advantage in comfort. But the key feature with this extraordinary peace of garment was another one. Strack straightened the lapel of the vest and made sure the two turrets were neatly hidden in the lining. They were tiny, with a caliber of just six millimetres and six shots each. Useless for outdoor shots, but on close proximity they could kill. While he righted his tie and buttoned down the vest he hoped to have no use for them today.

Reassured by his now flawless appearance he took one of the glasses from the nightstand and dipped it into the washbowl. It leaked but he had no time to complain about that. He threw the water in Schmied´s face and waited patiently until his partner stopped spluttering: _"Are you with me?"_

Schmied wiped the water from his eyes and groused: _"That wasn´t necessary."_

 _"Hey, stay with me here."_ Strack snapped a couple of times in front of Schmied´s face until he looked up annoyed.

 _"We kill the father."_

 _"Now?"_ asked Schmied, slightly lurching he added: _"What do I have to do?"_

Strack breathed deep before he said:

 _"Only keep sitting upright."_

~o~

Strack had waited by the window and now came back bolting around the chaise longue into the living room with an agility you wouldn't imagine in such a small, chubby man.

He sat down opposite to Schmied to carry on with a conversation they seemingly had been engaged in for some time:

"And then he says to me, Adam is dead! Just like that. Started cramping and died. Can you imagine something like that? We mustn´t tell the father of course." He raised his voice when he heard the door open and continued:" Poor Mr. Cartwright, his oldest son, dead just like that. You know, I think we should really depart."

The sound of a door falling shut made Strack turn around. As soon as his eye fell on the Cartwright patriarch his whole behavior changed. He paled and seemed to sink into himself. He imitated the embarrassment of someone severely caught out, and he gave the performance of a lifetime.

Ben just looked at his guests, the hat still on his head, one hand at the holster, frozen in the movement of opening the buckle.

Strack jumped to his feet:" I´m so sorry." He came deliberately over to his host, took hat and holster while he led him over to the plum-blue colored, velvet covered armchair.

"You´re sorry for what?" asked he, befuddled and irritated as Strack pushed him into the cushions.

"The case of death. So sudden. You have our deepest sympathy."

Ben nodded absent mindedly. He had been deep in his own thoughts while entering the house. He had heard voices but blended out the meaning of them completely. Believing his guest talked about Griff he was taken by surprise by the sympathy that went out to him.

He watched Strack bringing over three glasses of brandy:" This has to be a terrible blow."

"Sure." Ben answered and took his glass.

"We talked about departing, to come back at a more suitable time. Perhaps when you had the time to come to terms with… everything. Sorted out what you need to." He sat down gingerly on the sofa.

"Sort out?" Ben's thoughts still focused on the question what he should do with Candy. The Forman had just stopped and turned, before he went off again. But he took Adam with him and that had been a relief for Ben. His oldest son could tackle everything, and at least Candy wouldn´t be alone.

But Lucas had acted just as strange. Lucas had nearly dragged him out to show him something that looked just like any other hole in any other fence on this ranch. If he hadn´t known better he had thought Lucas was stalling, but what for? Outside in the rain during a storm Ben couldn´t come up with an explanation for this weird behavior. When they finally came home Lucas was limping, he said his leg fell asleep. Ben had lost his patience and made him go back to the bunk house with the firm order to lay down. This whole ranch had gone crazy.

"As soon as you find a new engineer for the mine." Strack´s babbling made it through his thoughts.

"A new engineer?" asked Ben surprised.

"Well yes, now after your son…" Strack seem lost for words.

"My son?" Oh God, what had Joe done now?

"After your son's death I mean." Strack tried to proceed.

"My son is dead?" Ben interjected.

"Yes, well…"

"Which?"

"Which what?"

"Which son?"

"The oldest"

"Adam is dead?"

"Yes."

"Nonsense." Ben put down the brandy and rose from the chair.

"For God´s sake – He´s dead." Strack visibly lost momentum, he too rose:

"Take a sip. A little Brandy will help to get your spirits up."

"I should get my spirits up? Because my son is dead?" Ben eyed his guest suspiciously:

"Are you alright?"

Strack wasn´t more than ten minutes away from biting the table.

Nothing was going according to plan.

The father was supposed to come in, accidentally overhear about the tragic destiny of his first born son, brokenly take the brandy with the opium and die. Preferably still sitting in this armchair.

Strack would have called for help, this damn cook would have come.

Heart failure. Oh how tragic.

We don´t want to intrude any further on this mourning family.

We feel with you. Bla, bla, bla.

And off to Sacramento, to real streets and functioning toilettes. But this damn family.

Strack sighed deeply and made a decision.

The head of the Cartwright family would, overcome with grief over the death of his son, commit suicide with his own pistol. Whether he wanted to or not.

Of course it was somehow terrible that Strack had sat with him while he did it. He, of course, tried to stop him, but everything happened so fast….

"Schmied, make sure this cook isn´t in the kitchen", Schmied got up clumsily and tumbled through the Livingroom.

"And lock the front door on your way back." Strack shouted after him.

Schmied muttered something and then added: "Nobody there."

Strack waited for the reassuring snap of a lock before he reached for Ben´s gun.

"What are you doing?" Ben frowned, still eying his guest.

"It´s nothing personal." Strack said, and pulled the holster up nearer to him:

"Beautiful weapon, may I?"

"Sure." Ben said.

Strack drew the gun and admired it for some seconds, he slung the holster away from him. The heavy leather strap and buckle hit the curtain. Strack froze as the curtain expelled a painful gasp.


	11. Chapter 11

_Strack drew the gun and admired it for some seconds, he slung the holster away from him. The heavy leather strap and buckle hit the curtain. Strack froze as the curtain expelled a painful gasp._

Clem could have howled. His hand still pressed on his own mouth he hoped, against every likelihood, that perhaps they hadn´t heard him. If he hadn´t been such a pious man he would have sworn like a trooper.

"Who's there?" he heard Bens voice.

Great- normally he had to bellow before anyone in this city would even hear him. But don´t you dare try to hide behind a curtain! Perhaps he should test this phenomena on the next brawl in the saloon.

"It's me." Clem answered resigned. He shoved away the curtain, got promptly tangled in it and slammed with a sonorous "bang" against the rear wall. The little fellow next to Ben shouted in surprise.

Clem instinctively held up his hands, which made him lose his balance. He stumbled and fell roughly on his back.

Up from the floor, with one leg still entangled in the curtain he watched Joe and Hop Sing storm the living room. Only Hop Sing stopped inside Clem´s limited field of vision.

The China man had armed himself with the vegetable knife and glared at the German.

The Avenger of the Ponderosa, fearless fighter of roots and greens. Clem groaned.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Strack asked irritated.

"Drop the weapon." Joe hissed. He came into his living room, the same room his oldest brother taught him how to play checkers in, only to find a potential murderer, the man who tried to kill this very brother, in front of his father. With a gun. His father's gun, loosely aimed at his father's chest. Without thinking Joe drew his colt and focused on Strack´s heart: "Pa, they are assassins."

Stack dropped the gun instantly, like it tried to bite his hand:" Assassins? Heavens!"

"Joe, what is this nonsense about?" Ben´s temper, slowly but steadily ruffled nearer home.

"These are your contract killers?" asked Clem. He had peeled himself out of the curtain and made it to his feet, eventually.

"Contract killers?" Strack asked Ben with a stern voice:" I haven´t been so grossly insulted in my life!"

Ben tried something like an appeasing approach and failed miserably:" I can assure you…"

"You don´t have to assure me anything. I know this is a hard time for you all. With this poor boy and everything, but this? This is grotesque! We will leave. Immediately!" he turned to Schmied and barked at him in German _:" Go get the luggage! And do it fast, before they lock us up!"_

His partner nodded and began waddling his way up the stairs.

Meanwhile Strack snarled at Ben with undisguised fury:" Is this the way you treat a business partner? You hide..."he waved in Clem´s direction.

"I´m the Sheriff." He helped.

"The Sheriff." For a moment this news unbalanced the small man, but he got over the shock pretty quickly and kept on raging:" You hide the Sheriff behind your curtains? Why?"

"I really would like to know that, too." Ben answered.

"I can explain." Came a voice out of the wall cupboard. The lock clicked and Hoss unfolded into the living room.

Ben blinked, then boomed:" Are there more?"

The second curtain rustled and a pretty bashful Candy emerged: "Mr. Cartwright, they really... "

"Don´t make the mistake of overestimating my patience." His employer growled:" Mr. Strack and his Companion are..."

"Dung beetles!" came a yell from the dining room window.

"Liz!" Candy yelled out to her.

Strack turned on his heel and eyed the chubby figure at the window, who now raised her arms apologetic:" I know, I should have waited, but I wanted to do this for so, so long."

"Who are you?" screamed Strack.

"Me?" Liz beamed at him:" Today Sir, your end."

For a couple of seconds Strack just stared at her, and then let out a guffaw. Liz laughed with him, somehow choppier while she pushed herself through the window. She landed in the dining room, picked herself up and closed the window nice and neat. She reached, a still laughing Strack. He wiped away hysterical tears and looked up soon enough to see Liz´s swing, but too late to dodge it.

She kept bashing until Hoss griped her from behind and lifted her off the ground. This saved Strack, but yielded him with some blue shines.

"She´s insane!" Strack, sitting on the hard wooden floor, pressed his handkerchief against his bleeding lip.

"You can just count yourself lucky these idiots took my gun!" Liz struggled against Hoss grip.

"Gun?" Strack´s voice went higher:" That´s … I … thus." He helped himself up to the sofa and pushed Ben's well-meaning hands aside:" We will go. Right now."

"We can´t let them leave like this!" Joe growled, the gun still at aim.

"Joseph!" Bens voice whipped through the living room:" Stop this."

Clem looked at the mustered German fist, then his eyes went to Joe´s petrified face:" Joe, put the gun down."

"They poisoned my brother!" anger drained all color from Joe's face:" And you want to let them leave?"

"I don´t want anything. But you won´t threaten anybody in my presence." Clem answered calmly.

"He is lying in that damn wagon behind the house. You want another look?" Joe snapped back:"and you want to protect this rat?"

The discussion about his safety left Strack completely untouched. He had listened to all Joe had to say but only to turn to Candy:" So he isn´t dead?" Strack asked, his eyes getting smaller:" Why would you tell me something that wasn't true?"

Candy surprised himself by smiling:" Must have been a mistake."

Strack nodded approvingly.

"What is with Adam?" Ben interjected.

"These two maniacs poisoned him." Joe repeated.

"A stomach upset is not poisoning." Came from Strack.

"Arsenic is not a stomach upset." snapped Liz.

Hoss still tried to restrain her, but it became clear that it took more and more out of him not to go for Strack himself.

"That´s enough." Clem interjected.

"So you're letting them go?" Joe snapped.

"No." Clem looked to Strack and stated:" I must ask you not to leave, until these accusations have been examined sufficiently."

With that he turned back to Joe:" And now put that thing away."

A scream from the backyard startled them.

It was followed by a shot, some impacts against the wall, a thud and Schmied´s loud voice. He screamed something, raging with anger.

All heads automatically turned to the turmoil, but it was Candy who made it with three steps to the backyard window, only to see a pale and disoriented Griff who pushed himself in front of a girl. Directly between her and the barrel of Schmied´s gun.

While Candy tried to open the window he heard Strack´s jarring voice:" Would you please be so kind as to stop, right there."

But it wasn´t the voice, but the bullet that shattered the window that made him spin around.

Gloating, Strack drew a second gun, not bigger than the palm of his hand.

He was smiling again. Engagingly.

He had assessed the situation, considered and weighed it up. And he had come to the conclusion that he was fed up. He wouldn´t talk his way out of this one, but perhaps he could shoot it out.

"You will all let your weapons fall." He said smoothly:" If you are cooperative, you will survive."

This was another of Strack´s flaws: He didn´t like to kill, if he wasn´t paid for it.

A gun hammer was pulled back, the click echoed in the sudden silence.

Joe´s colt remained raised, his whole body tensed, ready. Without looking at him Strack said:

"Joe, am I right? They say you are fast. You shoot me. I shoot one of these persons present, or maybe two. You know, equally how fast you are, you won´t be able to stop me before firing." Strack changed the direction of the gun in his right hand ever so slightly:" Your father perhaps?" he turned the left and only half an inch:" Or your brother?"

Joe stood frozen, while Strack proceeded:

"You can shoot, whenever you like. Just decide who´s funeral you´re willing to attend."

Perfect silence followed these words, before Joe let the hammer snap back.

"A good decision. Weapons down. All of you."

Slow, controlled hands let colts fall to the floor.

Again Strack nodded satisfied:" Hands up, palms behind your head."

They obeyed.

With his hands behind his head Candy slowly stepped to the side so he would be able to still see through the window. Broken glass crunched under his shoe soles. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Griff talking to Schmied, he looked like he was trying to calm the man. Scraps of paper danced over the ground next to their feet. Some were bundled up, some fluttered. Griff stood on some of the notes, they were taken by the wind when he took a step back. The girl always behind him, he made it to the side of the wagon. Schmied watched them, his arms dangling at his sides.

The girl crouched next to one of the wheels Schmied looked in Griff´s face, nodded a couple of times. He made some steps forward and stumbled.

He tried to catch himself, the colt flew up, a shot discharged.

Griff threw himself over the girl, before the shot hollowed. Schmied stopped. Looked at the scramble of bodies in front of him, how the girl peeled herself out of it.

She crawled out from under Griff´s form, he remained lying, face in the dust. Lifeless.

Schmied laughed.

Candy cried out. Before someone could stop him, he had pulled himself through the wooden frame. Didn´t feel the shards of the broken window, shredding his shirt, carving into his skin, didn´t even notice. Just like he didn´t even notice the shot in the room behind him.

~0~

Schmied reeled up the stairs.

Get the luggage. Do this. Do that.

He was fed up.

They hadn´t killed the father. But suddenly there were enough people to have a party.

Strack had been furious and Schmied was still blissfully drunk.

He more pulled himself up to the gallery than actively climbed the stairs.

He hadn´t understood a lot of the conversation. Everything was comfortably fuzzy. In this state the world lost the sharp edges he normally bumped into.

Now it didn´t matter what he did or said, nobody would remember. And if he was so far gone like he was now, normally he didn´t leave somebody to remember something.

The stairs ended and he made his way to their room.

He alternately pushed himself from the left to right corridor wall, unable to keep walking in a straight line.

It was fun.

Nearly jolly, he opened the door.

A young woman leaned over his bed, her arms full of his money, her hands in his suitcase. She pressed the bundles against her chest while she stared at him with fearful eyes.

She was pretty. Long brown hair, big eyes. A dark, worn-out dress. She was too thin.

She stole his money.

With an angry growl he ran across the room towards her. She jinked, jumped up onto the bed.

Flat-footed. He knocked over the table trying to reach her.

She screamed, again and again.

He drew his gun, but his clumsy fingers gave her enough time to reach the window and to climb out. He followed her. Saw her fleeing over the attic roof. Wood shingles loosened under her feet, were pushed down as he tried to follow her. She already climbed down half the pine that grew next to the porch. It wound its way up like a natural ladder.

She climbed faster than he could.

She would evade.

He shouted, looked closer and stopped baffled.

There stood a blue wagon. Made out of wood. With a ridiculous tooth on top of it that swung in the wind. Laughed at him.

The wagon, just like the one that wretched doctor had. Schmied spat out. Bad whiskey. It wasn´t the first time that they had visited him. As easy as the alcohol made the present, it could play nasty games with the past.

He saw them behind store windows, in stage coaches. They sat at his table and asked for salt. Their sculls wrecked, drowned, bloated bodies, half rotten they emerged from their graves just for him.

Only because he put them into those graves.

He took their lives, so they played with his.

Gruffly he swiped the back of his hand over his eyes. This wasn´t real. They never were.

They might stand in bed in the middle of the night, screaming. Crying on the pillow next to him.

But they weren´t real.

This thief was real.

He looked down in the backyard, she still was there.

Like Schmied she stood there, frozen. Her eyes fixed on the young man who plodded towards her. A young man with raven black hair.

Schmied howled.

He had killed this fiend. Struck him dead and drowned him.

The boy swayed. Had already lost the feeling for his cold, moribund limbs.

The thief lost her stupor and screamed.

A tortured, pervasive loud wail that ripped deep into Schmied. Made him shiver. He pressed his hands over his ears. But it wasn´t enough.

He had to make her stop.

Had to banish the pictures.

The screams.

He pointed the gun to the sky and fired.

The screams stopped abrupt.

The girl and the dead boy looked up to him.

She had let go of the money. It swirled around the unequal pair.

Roaring with fury Schmied reached for the Pine branches.

They didn´t support his weight. Splintering and groaning they made him fall.

He landed hard.

But the merciful fog in his head dimmed the pain.

Hobbling he approached the pair.

The black haired fiend looked up.

Eyes big and begging.

He had come back so fast. No grave to hold him.

Not now.

He talked. His voice grinding and raw. The words slurring, washed out. Swearing and sorrow. Gargling, not human anymore.

Schmied couldn't stand to look at him.

He needed to kill him. Again and again.

Equally how often he would crawl back. Like all the others.

It made no difference.

He stopped counting, didn´t even remember the names, just like his.

Schmied made a step forward, tried to chase him away, back to the hell he had creeped out from.

He made the mistake to look in the eyes of the specter. Saw surprise and shock. Perhaps compassion.

But the ground shook and suddenly something banged in his hand.

Then the spook vanished, decayed into a bag of rags and took the girl with him.

Joy flooded through Schmied, like every time he send his demons back. He threw his head in his neck and laughed relieved.

~0~

Clem always thought of himself as a man who could judge people pretty good. Virginia City was a vivid town. Miners, stagecoaches, the pony express, solider tracks, cattle trails, gambler, whores, Mormons and opera singers, sooner or later everything showed up on his doorstep.

But watching this small, flawlessly dressed man who looked at the world through friendly eyes promising Joe the death of his father, Clem had to admit, that he had judged himself wrong.

He hadn´t seen anything like this man ever before. In his behavior there was no thread. He could have tried to sell them a pair of trousers with the same sincere smile. He would do it efficiently and afterwards be proud about a job well done.

Clem shuddered.

He watched Candy inching closer to the window.

The German saw it. He had to see it. But he didn´t react. His attention stayed focused on Joe, while he made the man fetter his father.

All of them were waiting, for something, an opportunity, an inattention, anything that would distract the German.

So the backyard shoot, worked like a start shoot.

Next to Clem Candy shouted and threw himself out of the window, the bullet Strack send after him burst the wooden frame.

Hoss automatically pulled his shackled father out of the danger zone and ended up with him behind the stairs. Joe went down to snatch his gun from the floor. The gipsy woman rolled behind the wood stack at the fire place while Hop Sing and Clem simultaneously tried to reach the German as long as he was confused and indecisive.

Hop Sing reached Strack first.

He threw himself into Strack´s raised arm, hoping to knock the gun out of his grip. But the German made halting steps aside and Hop Sing missed him. The cook knocked into the edge of the sofa, caught himself and stopped, when cold steel touched his temple.

Strack pulled the hammer and fired.

With a simple movement of his finger, he stopped time.


	12. Chapter 12

_The cook nocked into the edge of the sofa, caught himself and stopped, when cold steel touched his temple._

 _Strack pulled the hammer and fired._

 _With a simple movement of his finger he stopped the time._

Clem flinched when the bullet hit the crossbeam over the mantelpiece. Just a fingers breadth away from his ear.

Strack, the other pistol still pressed against Hop Sings temple snarled: "This was a friendly warning. Up gentleman. On your feet, or this domestic –ARGH!" he interrupted himself because Hop Sing completely unmoved by the threat to his life, rammed the potato peeler deep into Strack´s hand. Cursing Strack let go of the pistol.

Hop Sing used the time to hammer his elbow into Strack´s stomach.

Strack collapsed and lost the second weapon too. He kicked out at Hop Sing and caught the knee of the China man. Hop Sing grimaced and bend forward. Strack kicked again, this time aiming for Hop Sings head and made the cook stumble into the chess table.

Shattering, the delicate furniture piece burst under Hop Sings impact and he fell down in a cloud of parts. Just when Joe righted himself, with his gun securely back in his hand, aiming at the killer.

Strack didn´t realize the danger for him, he was busy pulling a potato peeler out of his hand. He held the peeler in the uninjured hand while he flexed his still profusely bleeding hand testing the mobility.

More on instinct than a real movement led him to look up and scramble out of the way just in time.

Joes shot drilled into the wooden floor. He made a step around the ottoman, keeping the German in his field of vision.

Strack scuttled backwards, bumped into furniture and forced himself around the chair and under the huge oak-desk.

Seconds later the potato peeler was flung from under the table. The shrill voice of the contract killer screeched:" I´m unarmed. I surrender."

Joe, unswerving in his intent, made his way to the table, the colt steadily directed at the lump of grey clothing.

"I surrender!" it came desperate from under the table:" Please, arrest me!"

But Joe squatted in front of the table, his face completely bland he corrected his aim.

This was the moment Strack realized, that Joe would kill him. He had been brought too far. This time this twisting creature hadn't killed his family, but he wouldn´t offer any more chances.

The murderer squeaked, animalistic, driven by raw mortal fear. Pressed himself against one of the table legs.

Oblivious of his father yelling behind him Joe pulled the trigger.

In the last moment a hand knocked Joe´s colt upwards, sending the bullet into the roof of the room. Another hand laid itself on the shoulder of the young man.

"Give the Colt to me." Clem´s voice was calm, relaxed, when he took the gun out of Joes fingers.

Joe watched Clem put the gun into his belt, suddenly his eyes flickered to the still crouching Strack.

Sudden shock drove the blood from Joe's face.

Clem knew this reaction and strengthened the grip on the shoulder of the young man:

"Joe, look at me."

Joe remained unmoving, only spat out:" I would have killed him. I wanted to kill him, he…"

"But you haven´t."

"But I wanted to. I wanted…" Joe muttered.

Clem shook him, but couldn´t get the young man to react:" I simply would have shot him."

"Son numba three saves Hop Sing life!" the small cook, with his face beaten and his nose bloody had fallen to his knees next to them. He carefully touched the arm of the youth:

"Numba three son sees too much today. Mista Griff, Mista Adam." He tipped on the chest of the young man and with that broke Joe´s stupor:

"Numba three son, too much pain today. Pain drew, Pain aimed."

"But I wanted to kill him. Hop Sing, if I had killed him. Just like that. Like he would."

Hop Sing shook his head:" Numba three son couldn´t kill."

"Why? I even pulled the trigger."

"Because of this!" Hop Sing pointed at the slightly befuddled Clem:

"Friends. Think, when numba three son can´t. Help, when numba three son can´t. Murderer don´t have friends like that. Good man have friends like this. Are part of a good man." He repeated tipping against Joe´s chest:

"Good heart. Because of good heart, so much pain."

Joe exhaled a shaky breath, when Hop Sing and Clem pulled him to his feet.

Clem left the Cartwright son to the care of the little cook. Then he bent forward to have a better look beneath the table and said with a voice of steel:

"You are under arrest. Now let go of the table leg and crawl out of there!"

~0~

Candy sprinted over the backyard and came to a stop sliding, when Schmied turned to him with his weapon ready.

"What?" he slurred, even a word with four letters.

Suddenly very aware of the fact, that his gun lay safe and sound on the living room floor, Candy raised his hands. He simply hadn´t had the time to pick it up. Reaching Griff had been so much more important.

Schmied in a stroppy pose, waved the gun in the direction of the wagon:" Get over there."

Candy´s focus stayed on the metal while he carefully made his way to the wagon. Five steps to Griff, four, three...

"That's enough." Said Schmied. He seemed unsure what to do next.

He had an order to fulfill. But he hadn't fulfilled it and now he was lost.

Candy heard shouting from the house. A grim satisfaction settled on him.

"I think your colleague is in trouble."

Schmied eyes flicked nervously to the broken window.

"You could just drop your gun." Candy tested.

Schmied snarled:" Shut up." He took the gun in both hands:" Know you. You went off. Searching for…" he pointed at the figure on the ground.

Schmied seemed deep in thought when more shots echoed from the living room.

"Too late for that." He then mumbled.

"You brute!" the girl, just seconds ago bent over Griff´s body now kneeled in front of him like she wanted to shield the lifeless bundle. Her hands dug deeply into the mud and to Candy´s amazement, she started to throw dirt at the killer:" Dog! Thug! Hoodlum! Monster! Scoundrel!"

Irritated Schmied avoided a hand full of mud and fixed his gaze on the girl:" Monster?" he smiled, thin-lipped, disgustingly and made a lurching step towards her:

"So I best not disappoint you my dear."

The girl remained, both hands stuck deep into the morass, her eyes wide with panic she watch unmoving as the felon came nearer. His smile grew wider.

Then several things happened simultaneously.

Candy took off at a sprint, but stopped puzzled when something the size of a loaf of bread flew past him and hit the murderer at the hip.

Schmied yelped, missed a step and stumbled, but remained on his feet. He recovered himself quickly and turned the gun back on Candy, at the exact moment another object rushed through the air and hit him with a thung on the side of his head.

He rolled his eyes and said loud and clear:

"Without whipped cream, thank you." Then he toppled over.

In shock Candy looked at the broken window and saw Liz, another log of firewood in her hands, still positioned for throwing it.

She noticed Candy´s glance and snapped:

"What...You took my rifle!"

Candy almost laughed.

Instead he shook his head and turned in time to see the girl grab the gun of the contract killer only to immediately stumble back to Griff.

Candy approached her slowly, only to be stopped by a very quiet tired sounding voice.

"Is he..?" Adam looked out of the wagon. He had been woken by the melee and had made his way, both hands clawing the wall, to the wagon door.

Candy spared him one approving glance, but said nothing.

His look spoke volumes.

Adam felt something ice cold seep into his guts, while he watched Candy slowly walking towards the remains of his friend.

"Don´t come nearer!" that was the voice of a girl, and to Adams surprise, there was indeed a girl kneeling next to Griff, with a gun.

"I´m a friend." Candy simply stated.

The girl searched something in his gaze, then her eyes wandered to his boots.

"I.." she gestured towards Griff, pushed tentatively her mud caked hand in his direction:" I´m sorry." She seemed to be afraid to touch him: "I never wanted this."

"What didn´t you want?" asked Candy, still inching nearer to her. The girl didn´t look dangerous, but the gun in her hand looked it.

"I just wanted Pa to…" her voice trailed off, when she finally stretched her hand to touch Griff´s forehead. She flinched, like she felt the bruises:" I really didn´t want it." The hand with the gun collided with the ground, as if she wasn't strong enough to hold it up anymore. But she didn´t let go. She looked up to Candy, nameless fear in her eyes.

Suddenly she flinched even harder and looked back at the ground. Candy followed her gaze and saw a battered hand tenderly slide over her one.

Griff´s eyes only opened enough to give a hint of a storm blue iris.

"You … all right?" Candy could have cheered over this shredded voice, so intoxicating was the relief.

"What am I doing in the mud?" asked Griff:

"Starting to become a bad habit."

Instead of answering the girl started to cry. Thick, soundless drops streamed down her face. In total contrast to this stood her mouth, it´s corners creeped upwards steadily.

Griff blinked and seemed to have trouble seeing her:" You crying? I´ve done… something wrong?"

To this the girl laughed loud, bend forward and slung her arms around the body on the ground. Candy heard, muffled through hair and clothes how she said:" You´re such an idiot."

"And you are dirty." Griff´s voice sounded surprised.

A crash behind Candy made him swirl, Adams legs had given out and he had fallen into the wagon wall.

"Adam?" asked Candy carefully.

But Adam waved him off and let himself slide to the ground of the wagon, his head lolling back against the wooden wall:

" I´m ok. Just thought…" he wagged at Griff:

"He really needs to stop dying."

Candy had to agree with that one.

~0~

The following hours went by in a whirl of running, shouting and the indistinct feeling that they had gotten away only by sheer luck.

The Cartwright patriarch listened, with growing confusion to fragments of the story provided by individual people who rushed through the house, carried poisoned brothers, pulled contract killers out from under the dining table or swept up the former chess table.

When Candy came stumbling in with a girl and Griff Ben had stopped his foreman and asked him:" Did somebody die?"

Candy had an examining look around the room and then shock his head.

Ben had taken a deep breath and immediately begun sorting out the situation.

He sent Joe to the bunkhouse to fetch some of the hands. Dusty took one look at Griff and showed a highly concerning mixture of childlike joy and murderous rage. But his attempts to talk to the youth were interrupted by his employer who sent him to Virginia City to fetch the doctor.

Meanwhile Clem, Jack and Joe were outside dealing with the Germans. Schmied still hadn´t regained consciousness, and Strack surely wished to share this fate, as soon as he stepped under Joes scorching gaze.

So Joe kept watch over the two Germans and Jack and Clem kept an eye on him.

Adam had been brought to his room, where he now was given another dose of Papperjack by a closely guarded Liz. Hoss and Ben stayed with them, for one because Hoss somehow managed to feel guilty for not being poisoned himself and secondly because Ben wouldn´t leave his son to the ministration of an unknown and dismembered woman.

Griff on the other hand, was a completely different story.

On the dirt floor of the backyard he had slowly righted himself and had been officially surprised to see Candy. Candy had helped him on his feet, only to catch the boy, when his legs wouldn´t carry him.

"Vorsicht!" the girl had said.

"Du und deine guten Ratschläge." Griff had answered.

Candy had looked at them puzzled, but they hadn´t even realized, that they had fallen into another language.

The girl automatically caught Griff´s other arm, which made him cry out.

"Where did he get you?" Candy asked and Griff just looked even more confused.

"Got me?" he had asked.

Candy hadn't answered, he simply had pushed the bandages aside to see, what caused the growing red patch over Griff´s collarbone.

"Went right through." Candy nodded.

It had bled, steady, but not heavy. The panic, that had crept into Candy since he had seen Griff falling next to this tire, slowly ebbed away, leaving him light headed. For a moment he had to lean against the wagon wheel. He had no idea how Griff had managed to survive this, but he sure as hell wouldn't question it further.

"This suck´s." Griff said miserably.

"I quite believe it." Answered Candy, repelling himself off the wheel and on his feet. He tenderly got Griff under the armpits and heaved him to his feet:" Let´s get you inside."

By the time they made it to the porch Griff started to push their hands away and to protest. He didn´t want to go in the main house, he had a nice bunkbed – that scorchingly came back to Candy´s mind as still not having any ropes.

They finally transferred him onto the sofa.

There he sat, muddy and bleeding, ruining the furniture. But nobody cared about it.

In the living room had been activity, that was now relocated outside or upstairs.

The girl was still crying. She cried silently and tried very hard not to, but the tears still came.

Candy left the two to find Hop Sing, a pot of chamomile stock and some clean cloth. It took some time till he found all he searched for. He was more than surprised to see a bloody lip and a swollen cheek on the China man, but he didn't want to explain it, so Candy let it go.

When they both came back to the living room they were greeted with an unexpected view.

Griff sat on the edge of the sofa, his damaged foot on the coffee-table, a cushion on his thigh. The girls head rested on the cushion. He let his hand glide through her hair, again and again. The tears had left pink tracks on her mud caked face. Her eyes were closed but her breath still hitched here and there.

Griff brought a finger to his lips, as the two men approached:" She had a tough time."

Candy lifted an eyebrow, but only asked:

" Who is she?"

Griff´s other hand came up to mechanically rub his face, he seemed to struggle with himself and to lose: " Maria."

Candy sat down next to Griff´s feet on the coffee table:" Maria?" he asked and started swiping the dirt from Griff´s hands and face.

Griff let him work, too exhausted to care.

"I was in prison with her father." He held Candy´s gaze for a couple of seconds and added:" saved my life." A grimace followed, as Hop Sing pressed one of the linen cloths firmly onto the exit wound to stop the bloodflow.

"He was… German." When Hop Sing reduced the pressure to scuttle away and find more towels, Griff let his head sink back onto the backrest:

"Thought me the language. Came in handy, you know, if no one could tell what you said."

"What is she doing here?" asked Candy, he heard how tart that sounded and quickly added:

" Why didn´t you introduce us?"

Griff laughed quietly:" And how should I have done that: This is Maria. Please say hello, her father and I were the most popular jailbirds in the Nevada State Prison. But she´s a Lady!"

Candy looked up:" It wouldn´t have made any difference." He said seriously.

Griff´s features softened looking and Candy:

" Recon you´re right." He toyed with one of her hair strands:" But she wouldn´t let me."

"Why?" something was wrong here, it was more a feeling than something substantial, but it alarmed Candy:

"Griff, why is she here?"

Griff avoided Candy's gaze until Candy gipped his chin and made him look in his face:" Griff?"

Griff closed his eyes while he answered:

"She appeared for the second time… five days ago."

"For the second time?" asked Candy stunned.

"Yeah, she appeared for the first time… about two months back. Was about her father. He fell ill and… getting medicine in that hell-hole." Griff shook his head:

"Everybody is holding their hands up." Griff said dryly:

" You not only have to buy the stuff, you have to pay the guards and… but he was worth it. Would have been worth everything…" Griff interrupted himself, and stated very quietly:

"But I couldn´t do it."

"What couldn't you do?" asked Candy and felt his innards turning to ice.

Griff talked to the lean of the sofa, his weak voice void of every emotion:" He died."

`I´m sorry´ `To late´ `Too slow. Not enough´ Griff´s desperate cry for help struck out from the rotating memories in Candy's head.

Stunned, battered, after running himself into the ground to save his friend. He had begged for forgiveness and Candy hadn´t understood him.

"Why?" haven´t you said something? Haven´t asked for money?

But then it struck Candy: Griff had asked for help, for money, every way he could think of. He hadn´t told him about his dead fried because Candy had been too busy drinking Sherry in Sacramento.

Griff misinterpreted Candy´s question and murmured:" Thought it was better, if the guy´s didn´t know. Not all of it was… legal." He snarled joyless:" I even tried to sell thunder. But nobody wanted that stubborn beast." He still stared very persistently at the sofa pattern:

"I couldn´t risk one of you getting tangled in all this. But I couldn´t send Maria away either. Even if I have to go back now." He swallowed compulsively:" Peter should have been the one who gets another chance. Not me." He said it casually, like they were talking about the new life stock:

"He would have had something to do."

Before Candy could interject a new thought seem to occur to Griff and he quickly added:

"Maria had nothing to do with what I did. Ok? I´ll pay it back. I swear. But when she said he was dead…. If you haven't the money they won´t bury him. Just drop him in a hole." His stare would burn holes into the sofa very soon:" A couple of months. Then I´ll pay it all back. Even what Maria stole. Please."

This "please" made something in Candy´s brain finally lock into place.

But the voice that answered Griff was darker and shook with suppressed anger:

" Don't worry about the money."

Griff and Candy´s heads jerked around in unison at Ben Cartwright´s words.

The patriarch stood behind the table, a blanket apparently intended for Griff in his hands.

"Mr. Cartwright, I´m sorry. I- "began Griff, but Ben interrupted him.

"You shouldn´t be. There is nothing wrong in helping a friend, equally where you find this friend." Ben crossed the room at a rapid pace, but Griff rejected the blanket:

" Her." Was the only thing he said.

Ben glanced over his crumpled form and while he covered the girl in the soft-knitted fabric he said:" I thought we tidied up this cesspool of vice."

Griff flinched as if he had hit him:

"I understand, I will go and –"

"Griff, you won´t go back there." Ben had stopped, standing next to Candy.

Griff's brow furrowed, but in his eyes glimmered something resembling frantic hope:

"Not going back?"

"That never even entered the equation." Ben told the boy.

A voice called for him and he turned back to the stairs:" We will talk about this, don´t worry."

Griff nodded mechanically.

Candy bent over to the sofa even more, one elbow resting on his knee. He watched for a moment as various emotions played over Griff´s face.

Then his hand moved and came to rest carefully on Griff´s neck. This made Griff look at him:" I´m sorry."

Candy shook his head:" No need to be. You did good."

"Not enough." Griff´s face grimaced in pain:

"He was… for, for a long time the only thing that kept me alive. And I? He didn´t belong in there. He was too good."

Candy could see the cracks emerge in Griff´s façade, deepen and finally crumble:

"Too much heart. And I? I couldn´t …. Why couldn´t I?" tears again.

This time it wasn't the result of medication. Just too much misery in such a short life. Candy´s other hand shoot forward without him thinking about it. Laid itself around the other side of the youth neck and drew him closer. He registered how Griff´s free hand clung to his sleeve.

"They can´t bury him… not in one of this pits." He was gasping:" There is no stone, no cross, he would be lost."

Candy said nothing, just held on to the sobbing boy for dear life.

"As if he never lived." Griff doubled up, his forehead colliding with Candy´s. They remained like this and Candy had the feeling only his hands kept the youth together.

When he answered his voice was hoarse and low:" That will not happen. We won´t let that happen. You hear me? He will get a proper burial."

Griff just shook his head.

"After all, I´m in his debt." Candy words let Griff stop, made him meet Candy´s eyes.

Candy held the gaze:" He saved you, I could never settle that score."


	13. Chapter 13

The doctor took one look at Griff and filled a syringe with morphine.

That had been two days ago and since then Griff slept, in Candy´s bed, even though the guys had repaired his own one by now. Thankfully for Griff he didn´t react as severe to the morphine as he reacted to whatever Liz had given him. He still kept mumbling and occasionally thrashing in the bed, but the semiconscious terrors from before didn´t repeated themselves.

Maria had woken up after a while, disoriented and panicked, until Candy brought her to Griff.

After that Hop Sing had send her off to take a bath, had somehow found clothes for her and burned her old ones with considerable satisfaction.

Especially Adam was happy to hear that someone had been sneaking around the ranch. He didn´t mention it, but to be honest he started to fear for his mind.

Candy had wanted to stay with Griff, but after a lot of diplomacy, some bribery and some flat out threats he made a break.

So he sat opposite Maria and watched her devour a portion that would have made Hoss proud.

She hadn´t talked much waking up. Had silently sat at Griff´s bed, had silently vanished into the bathhouse and had silently entered the kitchen.

Now she sat at the round table and Hop Sing shoveled greens onto her plate. Another plate with fried chicken stood in front of her, a small basket with cornbread next to it.

Hop Sing kept busying himself in the kitchen, which resulted in an occasional rustling, some swooshing, the fast staccato from the knife on the chopping block and the clattering of many dishes.

A cup of tea had emerged in front of Candy. It was a cup of the white and blue service, with a saucer and a small spoon. Candy couldn´t remember how the cup had appeared under his nose, but it was filled with strong sweet tea, and so he decided to stick with the important things.

Maria darted a surreptitious glance at Candy, swallowed and said: " I´m sorry."

In the last couple of days Candy had heard this sentence way too often. Every time from the wrong person and every time for the wrong reasons.

This girl just lost her father, had hid herself for days in a storm on a ranch with contract killers on the loose and the only person she could expect help from had been knocked down and drowned.

And she was the one who was sorry.

He had to fight the temptation to hug her and shield her from some of the pain, perhaps tell her that now everything would get better. That she shouldn´t worry. But he had the strong feeling that would spook her.

"What for?" Candy asked instead. He rubbed his eyes. He was incredibly tired, but every time he closed his eyes images of the last days appeared. They were too fresh. Too strong to let him rest. He took another sip of his tea.

"I think, I did this to Griff." She said and picked at the greens, who really didn´t look as though they deserved such treatment.

"What do you mean?" asked Candy.

"When I opened my eyes lying on this sofa…" she decided on a leaf and spiked it:

"I had the sensation of waking up the first time after getting the letter of pa´s death. I remember walking, and talking since then, but it´s more like… remembering a dream."

She inspected the leaf thoroughly, but didn´t eat it:" I didn´t know whom to turn to. If I would have known that Griff would get hurt, trying to get the money…" she shook her head, let the fork sink on the table and reached for the cornbread:

"No, I´m not even sure that I had realized if he had lost a leg." She looked at the cornbread with disgust, but Candy got the feeling that it was her own hand that appalled her:" This is no excuse. There is no excuse. I can´t say what got into me. I would have done everything to get this money. Only thing I could think about was Pa disappearing in one of these … hell-holes. I never noticed what Griff did to himself. I was… driven by…" she put the cornbread on her plate:" Pa would be hopping mad with me."

She was clearly fighting to hold back tears and Candy simply had no clue what to say. His brain drifted through the conversation, still flooded with relief over Griff and filled with the pink poison of forced sleeplessness. So much had happened, so many people suffered these last days, it never occurred to him that he could or should have a need to be angry with this girl.

~0~

The man said nothing, she couldn't resent it. She couldn't understand anyhow, why she hadn´t been thrown out immediately.

Since Maria had woken up her emotions changed from guilt to panic. Panic because Griff had nearly died in her arms and guilt because she nearly killed him. He had been the only one who helped her after her father´s death. She had wanted to say sorry. But while she sat at his bed, watched him slip through another nightmare, she couldn´t wake him up. The only thing she could do was sit there and watch over his sleep, silently begging him not to hate her. He didn´t have to forgive her, just listen to her long enough so she could apologize, after that he could chase her to the devil.

But as long as Griff couldn't hear her, she would do the next best thing and apologize to the man who had brought Griff back. But the man seemed just as mad at her, as she was mad at herself. He remained sitting hunched over slightly, stoically staring into his cup.

To her surprise the small cook answered her:" Mista Griff isn´t dumb boy."

"Pardon?" she said, not entirely sure what she heard.

"Mista Griff stubborn, but not dumb. Don´t let himself force doing things he doesn´t want to do. If he hadn´t want to, get the money, he wouldn´t have gotten the money." With a slight emphasis the small cook chucked another log into the oven, his voice grew more intense as he talked over the roaring of the fire:" You believe, he don´t want save father?"

"I…"

"You think he not want help him?"

"Surely." Maria watched the small cook nod grimly and then start to chop vegetables for a soup:" Mista Griff knows very good what to do. Sometimes heart too big. But that's never mistake." He held up the knife and flailed with it:" You don´t make Mista Griff small saying he don´t help friend. You hear?"

Maria nodded mechanically. Something inside her started to loosen. Something she never knew was knotted. She followed the movement of the cook, his precise way of cutting meat, putting on a kettle or sharpening a knife and tried to figure out if he meant what he said.

He noticed her gaze and proceeded:" You not the reason for Mista Griff falling off dumb horse and you very surly not reason for the two Goths!"

"Germans." The other man corrected automatically.

"Good as well." Said the small cook, he added in Maria's direction:" Only one thing that's your fault!"

"What?" said Maria and felt the knot lance up again.

"Good greens get cold. Eat! Or will taste horrible and Hop Sing lose all respect as cook!"

The knot loosened once again and without her wanting, Maria started to eat. It tasted fantastic, although it had a little too much salt.

Not until the other man carefully took the fork from her hand, and pulled her into his arms did she realize that her tears had made it salty.

~0~

Griff came around slowly. Sleep pulled at him. It nearly hurt to work his way out of the warmth and numbness.

He left his eyes closed, drifting for a bit. Waiting for something that would bring him back to the here and now. Perhaps the bleating of the summer herd or Dusty´s blaring laugh on his way back from the washhouse.

Something told him that he got a little carried away yesterday. His body felt funny. There was a strange pulsing behind his eyes, he felt sick and he was thirsty. But it was so much easier to lay there than to do something about that.

Hungover. He was hungover.

That was so not good. Alcohol was forbidden. He was on parole.

What had he been thinking?

Something funny restrained his right hand. Weighted it down, made it impossible to lift it. But something in this weight was familiar, he just couldn´t remember what.

"Drink some of this. Hop Sing's mix. It will help with the nausea."

For a moment he thought he had imagined the voice. It was on his left side, a little above him. Then a hand was laid on his forehead. Stayed there probingly, pushing his hair back.

"Come on, I know you are awake." A smile was within that deep voice when he proceeded:

"Joe is just the same." The hand stroked his head again. It was a pretty big hand.

"He gets sick from morphine, too." Said the deep voice:" Well, have it your way. It´s not like you have someplace to be right now. Would feel better with the tea, that's all. Believe me."

China clattered, then the deep voice said suddenly:" I´m glad you're back. Don´t know what we would have done with Candy if something had happened to you."

Griff heard clothing rustling, the creaking of a chair: " He loves you. Really does. Nearly went mad after you were gone." The voice paused, hummed something.

Just when Griff thought the speaker had fallen asleep he said: " Probably hard to settle in with us. All these people, always loud, always a lot going on. Easy to feel overwhelmed by it. But we´re good folks."

The voice kept it light, made it sound like he was talking about the weather, made Griff really listening to him: " But you will have to cope a little longer with us. The boys´ don´t want back their money. Actually, when they heard what it was for, they collected some more. Don´t worry, you´ll stay here, and we will get Peter out. Maria and Pa are on their way to get him."

That made Griff´s eyes snap open.

It took some seconds but finally they sharpened on Hoss smiling face:" Welcome back." And he really looked like he meant it.

"Tired." Griff mumbled.

"I'll bet. Doc came back three times to give you another shot. Said you gave it your best to look like a jigsaw."

Griff´s mouth corners went upwards.

"Are you in pain?"

Griff thought about the question and negated truthfully.

"That's good."

Griff groped around a little at the weight on his hand but finally turned his head to see what it was. Surprised he saw Candy sitting at the other side of the bed. His head leant against the side rest of the wing-back armchair and he breathed deep and regularly. His left hand closed firmly around Griff´s right one.

Griff shot Hoss a questioning look.

Hoss chuckled quietly: "Came in about an hour ago. I think he hasn´t really slept since he went off after you. Sat down, said he just wanted a quick look at you. You started fussing and tried to reach for something. Took your hand… and he was gone."

Griff examined the sleeping man with his brows drawn together. The last days had aged him. Deep rings under his eyes, tiredness talked out of the lines around his mouth.

"You like some tea now?" asked Hoss gently.

Griff nodded and Hoss helped him to swallow some of the liquid. He didn´t break the contact with Candy for one second and the Forman kept sleeping soundly.

"Is there something else you need?" Hoss voice implied half a grilled ox, two dozen ducklings or a lullaby.

"No I´m good."

Hoss nodded:" Try to sleep some more. When you wake up the world will be a little better."

So Griff closed his eyes.

When he opened them for the next time his eyelids weren´t so awfully heavy, Candy was gone, but his chair remained next to Griff´s bed. A silent promise ´I´ll be back.´

Griff smirked. The morphine seemed to have worn off, his whole body ached.

But it wasn´t the bright, burning pain he remembered, coupled with the swirling, disjointed pictures which hopefully would fade from memory.

He could handle this pain. He remembered Hoss words and the smirk grew wider. He now had a place to stay till the pain would subside.

Someone knocked shyly on the door and to Griff´s surprise Dusty poked his head in the room.

"You´re awake." He said in real delight:" How are you?"

"Better." Answered Griff irritated how hoarse his voice sounded.

Wordless Dusty handed him the cup from his night stand, so he could take a couple of sips.

"How long?" asked Griff.

Dusty observed him carefully: " Three days."

This caught Griff off guard, but Dusty´s nearly ashamed voice interrupted his thoughts:" We wanted to apologize."

He wrung his neck cloth in his hands while he talked, it made him look like a small boy.

Griff looked at him puzzled:" What for?"

"The pranks and all… we didn´t know you had the accident…"

Griff´s laugh stopped his mumble. Taken aback, he looked up.

"You guys do this to everyone." Griff tried to sit a little straighter, failed and let himself sink back into the pillows:" I was the complicated one." He scratched his neck:" It was just… so different from everything I knew. Took me a while to realize you would stop at a joke." He grinned at Dusty who furrowed his brow:

" What else did ye think would happen?"

The question changed Griff´s expression, nearly defensive he mumbled:" Some of the older inmates liked to play."

It was possible to pinpoint the exact moment Dusty realized what these words meant. He stared at Griff for a moment then pressed:

"Griff we didn't know. Gosh, we never would have …"

"It´s all right." The smile was back on Griff´s face, smaller, but there:" Not your fault. Just had to get accustomed to it."

Dusty listened to him still shocked about what their pranks could have meant to Griff.

Candy saved him by ramming the door in his back.

"Sorry, didn´t know there would be someone." He said and pulled the hand back on his feet.

Griff´s snickering made them both look up.

"You´re awake." Candy said and suddenly he was all smiles.

"Well you too." Answered Griff.

Dusty tried to use the conversation to get out of the room but stopped when Griff turned to him: " So… no bad blood?"

"What? Oh hell, no, course not!" and Dusty was out of the door.

"What was that about?" asked Candy and sank back into his armchair.

"Unimportant things." Answered Griff and yawed. He just woke up, from a three day nap, how could he possibly be tired?

"I hope not more pranks."

"You knew about it?"

"No. Since… a couple of days." Griff murmured something affirming and tried to keep his eyes fixed on Candy:" How is Adam?"

Absent- minded Candy smoothed the blanket before he said:" He is good. Up for two days now. Talking about a second bridge all the time. Those piled up trunks won´t hold for long."

"Not a bad idea." Griff yawed again.

Candy smiled:" Sleep some more, dinner in two hours and after that you´ll get something more for the pain."

"I…"

"You don´t need it. Like always." Candy interrupted:

"But I will feel better if you take it. So humor me."

Griff looked into the face of his friend. Saw the challenging glint in his eyes, the stubble on his chin told of too many hard days.

He closed his eyes and felt the blankets been pulled up.

It would hurt for a quite a while, but it was so much easier if you let somebody help you carry the pain, if you didn´t need to pretend to be all right.

Griff heard Candy stand up and open a window.

Voices drifted into the room. Liz loud laugh, Lucas grumbling and Goliath amused question:" She shot you where?!"


	14. Epilog

Clouds still piled up against the mountains, but for the first time in days the sun broke through them and created glowing patches on the fields.

The day was clear, a little cold maybe, but not as dark as the last weeks had been.

Ben Cartwright stood on the front porch and enjoyed the wind on his face. Tasted the wood fires, harbingers of a rapidly approaching fall. He was content and more thankful than he had been in a long time.

"Sir?" Griff´s voice pulled him out of his thoughts.

He turned around to face the youth, who leant on his crutches.

He looked better. His face still was bruised and swollen in some parts. He moved slowly and the way he stood spoke of his broken ribs and bruised hip. But the haunted look in his eyes had vanished.

He smiled and it was just like the sun breaking through the clouds.

The girl was with him.

She had lived with them for the last few weeks, but she had told Ben a couple of days before that she wouldn't be staying with them. Ben didn´t know if Griff knew that by now, but he assumed. He watched the two observingly. There was something that radiated from Griff whenever he was near her, it was the same force that appeared around Adam when one of his brothers was challenged. It had nothing to do with desire, but it was all about love.

They had buried her father in Virginia City. Maria had no fix address, just now she didn´t know where she wanted to live, but here were people who would take care of the grave, who knew its story and who wouldn't forget the man resting in it.

It had taken a lot of money, to get the remains of a father and a friend out from behind those prison walls, but not nearly enough to outweigh a life.

Griff hadn´t made it to the grave until now. The doc had made it quite clear that he couldn't come next nor near a horse until he was much improved.

Maria had offered to work off the money. Ben had told her, friendly but determined, that he wouldn´t accept a penny from her. This was the good thing about money, it couldn´t buy you something of real value, but it made things easier.

She apologized repeatedly for trespassing on the ranch, but Ben had just laughed and told her, next time she felt like coming over she should knock on the front door. There was plenty of room, and he was tired of his sons stomping through the dung trying to catch her.

Now, coming out on the porch behind Griff, Maria beamed.

Ben smiled back and said towards Griff:" You should sit down. Especially since you have this monstrosity standing here."

This strange woman had brought the chair for Griff. It wasn´t a traveling chair, it was massive, made out of oak. Higher than normal chairs, with a wide back rest and comfy arm rails.

She had shown up with the thing, placed it on the porch and said it was a gift from Albert to Griff. Whoever Albert was… but Ben wouldn´t ask.

Griff had looked at her in disbelief and had laughed like a small child.

At this moment Ben realized that Griff hadn´t owned a lot in his life and had been given even less. Now he sat on his chair every day, his bad foot on a rest before him and smiled at the horizon.

Ben sat down with Maria on the comfortable bank and the three spend half an hour in pleasant silence.

Then Griff cleared his throat and Ben looked at him. Griff´s eyes still followed the quickly moving cloud shadows, he didn´t seem ready to talk. Something Ben had seen in him sometime before. Griff did not relish being the center of attention, he would shrink back. If you wanted him to talk, you had to talk to him.

"Clem said that they have enough evidence to put the two Germans behind bars for a long time." He started carefully.

Griff´s eyes darkened:" Good." He said.

"This gypsy."

"Sinti and Roma." Griff corrected instantly:

"Her name is Liz."

"Liz, I´m sorry. She had collected enough for four trails. She seems like a very… energetic woman." He added.

That made Griff smile.

"They weren't allowed to keep the money either." Ben said, not without a grim satisfaction:" We don´t know to whom it belongs. But I´m sure Clem will keep a good eye on it, till we find out."

They sat again in silence.

Suddenly, without any connection Maria asked: "Who is Elisabeth Beltam?"

Bens head jerked upwards:" Where did you get that name from?"

"After they…" she couldn't seem to find the right words to describe the contract killers properly:" took Griff away." She shuddered and Griff automatically laid his hand over hers.

"I was in their room to, take the money for Pa…" she interrupted herself, but carried on after some seconds:" In this suit case, with the money, was a letter." She watched Ben with intelligent eyes and asked:" She send them, didn´t she?"

Ben nodded deep in thought, he stood up and closed the front door: "Is Adam still at this confounded bridge?" he asked after returning to them.

Griff nodded, surprised at the rapid change in topic.

Ben proceeded:" Clem has seen this letter too. We weren't sure whether we had to bring it up to give Schmied and Strack the death sentence they deserve. They have done enough while the sheriff was right in front of them." He trailed off somewhere lost in his thoughts.

He leaned back on his chair, one leg over the other, looking like a grandfather ready to tell his grandson a story.

"I think you two have a right to know…. After all. But you have to promise me, that everything I tell you now, will stay in this room. There has been enough pain."

Maria nodded, her brow furrowed.

Griff just stared, completely perplexed.

"First off: Elisabeth Beltam is dead. We had a correspondents with her lawyer, who found this letter in her estate, with the note to send on to Mr. Strack."

Ben scratched his temple:" He, the lawyer I mean, couldn´t think of a way how Mrs. Beltam got to know this rather… exotic pair. But it was written down in her last will and the lawyer didn´t know the meaning of the letter. He was shocked when we told him."

Griff snarled, but said nothing.

"I met Elisabeth´s brother, Tom, in a timber camp in California. This was a long time ago, Adam was very young, Hoss hadn´t been born. On this Day I was scheduled with Tom – he was a truly, truly good man – I should have gone out with him and cut down some of the bigger pines. Make room for a log rack. There had been a storm, and it blew us far behind schedule. But that night Adam developed a fever. At that time we lived on the road, I had bought a covered wagon."

Ben´s lips trembled as he thought of their time in the draughty vehicle. The winter had been lousy cold, no wonder the boy fell ill:" The fever climbed and Tom, being the man he was, insisted for me to stay with my boy. With Adam. If I had known what would happen… But I stayed and Tom went to clear the path, so the log rack would be free. The ground was too wet, the wind too strong, he shouldn´t had been out by himself. Perhaps he wouldn't have had the accident. Tom got jammed under one of the falling trees. When I went to search for him in the evening, he had been dead for hours." Ben´s eyes had dulled while he talked. In body he was on the porch of his home, safe and sound. His mind on the other hand wandered in dark memories searching for the soul of a lost friend:

"Adam took it very bad, worse than everyone else. He never blamed me, never blamed the storm, never blamed bad luck or fortune – he blamed himself. Not more than a boy. I believe it was the fever that drilled it into his head. Made it his fault. In his mind he killed Tom, and over this I nearly lost him too."

Maria made a unconscious movement, like she wanted to grab Ben, but he ripped himself out of his memories. Blinked a couple of times:" Elisabeth blamed me. Of course she was perfectly right with it. I should have gone with her brother, but I couldn´t leave my son. Elisabeth adored Tom. Since the two were small she had taken care of him. I believe he was just as much her son, as her brother. At the time I tried to … support her, help her… but she wouldn't let me. Didn´t want to see my, didn´t want to talk to me. I killed the most important person in her life."

"It was Tom´s decision." Griff said quietly.

Ben pulled his eyes from the table in front of him, to look up at Griff: "Pardon?"

"It was Tom´s decision. He wanted you to stay with your son. You can´t take responsibility for his actions, as long as you trusted his decisions." Griff´s arms were crossed in front of his chest and he looked at the patriarch thoughtfully:" Humans make decisions. Have their own will. If you take that from them, you´ll kill them."

It didn't surprise Ben that Griff thought like that. Griff had seen the worst side of this world for so long, that it couldn´t hide anything. In this way here and there Ben sneaked a peek into the soul of the young convict, it was astonishingly complex. Ben had learned that everything Griff said in his moments revealed an absolute truth for the youth. It comforted Ben somehow. Griff didn´t say it to help him with his guilt, he said it, because he thought it was the truth, and this made it so much easier for Ben to believe in the words.

"So you're telling us, she made sure you would die? With her last will?" Maria sounded horrified.

"She wanted me to suffer like she suffered." Ben cited from the letter.

"This is bullshit." Said Griff, his eyes still on his employee:" This wouldn´t have ended. There would have been more sorrow, you can´t erase pain with pain."

Then Griff realized what he said and looked away.

Ben cleared his throat:" I would be much obliged to you if you kept this to yourself. It had taken years for Adam to stop talking about Tom. I don´t know if he ever stopped thinking about him." He made a break:

"The story Clem will work with is an unknown client. The two hangdogs have refused to give evidence."

Griff smiled suddenly:" Probably are afraid of Liz visiting them in prison."

That made Ben smile too.

"She had asked me if I wanted to go with her." Maria inserted.

Both men looked at her surprised.

"And?" Griff asked.

"I think I will." Answered Maria:" She is nice and to be honest… I think she could use a little help, too."

"And a comb." Griff added, which earned him a slap from Maria: "She saved your life!"

"Good." Griff surrendered: "I´ll donate mine."

Ben listened to their bickering while watching the fleeing clouds. There are some days when you open your eyes, and you know you probably shouldn´t have. There would always be days like this. Ben stretched and let his dark thoughts go with the storm.

The important thing was how you faced those days.

END

 **So this was the story. I want to thank all of you who kept up with me all this time, it was a pleasure to write for you.**

 **Particularly Glenandme, who never got tired of reading the nonsense I produce. Thank you it really means a lot to me.**

 **As my next project I wanted something funny and challenging, so I decided to let other people choose what I write about.**

 **The next story will contain 6 terms which other people selected for me.**

 **These terms could be a person, an object, a weather phenomenon, an abstract concept, anything!**

 **The first two were selected by Glenandme, they are: cave and dogs.**

 **The second two were selected by my little sister, they are: endoplasmic reticulum and Irish jig. (Before you ask, yes she is a rather unusual girl)**

 **And the last two are up to you! The first two suggestions which are posted in the comments will be taken to consideration for the next story.**

 **I´m really curious about that and look forward to the next story.**

 **On this way I wanted to wish you all a happy and successful new year – may the best days of the past be the worst days of your future.**


End file.
